Redundancy and free childcare

[redundanttoday]

Hi all

I walked into work this morning and was made redundant as of today. I have been given one month’s notice and 4 weeks redundancy pay.

I hope to find another role ASAP but having spent the last 4 years recruiting locally I know the market is not in my favour right now and it won’t be easy.

I was working 25 hours and we claim 15 hours childcare so my son attends pre-school 2 days per week. He’s 3 at the end of May and was due to start 30 hours on June.

Will he lose the 15 hours between now and June?

I have read conflicting advice but it seems that I wait until asked to re-confirm before declaring the situation but I think that is due soon.

Any advice would be so appreciated. I’m still a bit lost and confused after the news this morning.

If he’s 3 at the end of May you wouldn’t have got the 30 funded hours until September anyway (it starts the term after they turn 3). You should still get the 15 hours until then though as you’re allowed the grace period, which will take you through til 31st August at this point

Thank you for replying. I’ve just realised this as well about the 30 hours! Is the grace period that long? I figured it would pretty much cut off when my work stopped

Yeah, I’ve recently gone through this myself and my childminder confirmed with the local authority. It depends when in a term you become ineligible, but if it’s in the second half of the term (as in your and my case), then you already have the funding set aside for the following term (so to the end of August). If it had happened in the first half of the term (Jan or first half of Feb), then the funding would only have lasted until the end of March.