3 year olds free childcare

Postofficehater

Hi all,

Probably a simple question for this site but I have searched the .gov site and cannot get a definitive answer.....

My daughter is now entitled to what I believed was 10hrs per week of free childcare.

The bill came from nursery saying "Child education grant: £123.75". (This is per month)

This leaves a short fall of £88.75 per month.

She is only there for 2 mornings each of 5 hour sessions.

Do the government only pay £2.97 per hour and we are having to pick up the shortfall?

The nursery charge £5.10 per hour.

Thanks all and I look forwards to being pointed in the right direction. :j

P.s. they are also now charging us for "food charge for free education grant" of £33 per month which was included in when we used to pay the full amount.

susancs

The 15 hours is for 38 weeks per year, so often in the case of children attending a nursery all year round they split it over 50 or 52 weeks (some nurseries close for 2 weeks at Christmas which is why I mention 50 weeks). The hours have to be free at the point of delivery and they can't charge top up fees, but can charge for food or extra activities.

Postofficehater

Thank-you.

So as she attends 50 weeks of the year for 10 hours a week, are you saying all of her hours should not be charged for but the £33 per month for food is acceptable?

susancs

You need to check with your nursery as the govt funding in a lot of cases is a lot less than the usual hourly rate and hence some nurseries only offer the funded hours at certain times of the day e.g. Our local nursery only offers 3 hours from 1 to 4pm, those attending mornings get no funded sessions, as they are over subscribed for mornings so would loose money. Some also don't include lunch time in funded hours ( as it is free early years education not childcare as such, although I know it is called 15 hours free childcare by many).

susancs

Postofficehater wrote: »

Thank-you.

So as she attends 50 weeks of the year for 10 hours a week, are you saying all of her hours should not be charged for but the £33 per month for food is acceptable?

The nursery can charge extra for snacks and food provided but under the terms of the funding they cannot force you to accept their food, so if you speak to them about providing your own food, they could reduce this bill. The free hours are 570 per annum and are usually offered as five three hour sessions or can be three 5 hour sessions. So if your nursery only offered the first option, then the 2 extra hours per day might be charged for. Your invoice should clearly show free hours and those charged for.

Postofficehater

Thanks again.

I could not see a way to attach the invoice so have added it to dropbox if you wouldn't mind taking a quick look?

It is a PDF file.

dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/78071689/invoice1.pdf

susancs

They are not taking off the hours but are instead taking off the monetary amount, which is not how the scheme is supposed to work. They cannot charge top up fees for free hours (except if offering extra activities e.g. swimming, computer lessons etc). Your child is entitled to 570 free hours over the year which over a 50 week period is 11.40 hours per week. If you have a look on your local county council website it will explain this. Your invoice should state e.g. x hours at X amount, X hours at 0 amount due to free nursery entitlement, x amount for food, x amount for swimming lessons etc. I assume your child does not attend nursery before 8am (as the scheme is only from 8am weekdays, before that time they can charge).

The problem is that many settings will not offer the free hours in its full entitlement as the funding is not enough to cover costs and a lot of authorities, do not clamp down on it as they should as they would struggle to keep a lot of settings in the scheme. The local authority have a duty to ensure there are enough funded places for children and clamping down would probably mean some settings (especially private nurseries) would choose to opt out of the scheme and there would be a shortfall, plus parents would pay full fees in settings that opt out, so would be worse off. Some nurseries get around this by offering the free hours but charging more for hours outside of these e.g. before 8am or after 6pm or restricting hours it can be used.

Sessional settings like pre-schools or school nurseries will usually give the full entitlement with no costs payable to parents and ask for the child to be supplied with a packed lunch.

Here is the link to the Govt guidance on it.
https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/351592/early_education_and_childcare_statutory_guidance_2014.pdf

The clauses below show clearly that the 15 hours have to be free and parents have to be clearly able to see this shown as free which your invoice does not as it shows a monetary value. Your local authority will have a published document based on the Govt legislation, which you should look for as they a have a duty to ensure the scheme is carried out correctly (c.7 complaints procedures).

A4b (pg.13) on the legislation states that local authorities must ensure that early education places are delivered completely free of charge to parents.

Also (pg19)
C.5 Ensure that parents can clearly see, from the information they receive from their provider, that they have received their child’s full 15 hour place completely free.

I would email the nursery along the lines of

"Thank you for your invoice of (date), but it seems to be incorrect as it is my understanding that the 15 hours free nursery education grant should be free at the point of delivery and clearly shown as free hours, on any invoice (as per the Govt legislation on funding the scheme clauses A4b and C.5). Our Local authority ... also states....... in regard to funding. As my hours are 10 hours per week but spread over 50 weeks a year (free hours maximimum entitlement 11.4 hours per week over 50 weeks/ 570 hours p.a.), this means I should have no "top up" costs to the 10 hours apart from the food supplied.

I would be grateful if I could have my invoice ammended accordingly for this month and future months showing the free childcare I receive each month and a charge only for any food provided.

I look forward to receiving your revised invoice.

Postofficehater

Once again, thank you for your time.

She is in Nurserey from 8.00 a.m. until 1 p.m Tuesdays and Thursdays.

I will speak to them initially now I have some ammunition and if no good, will send their head office an e-mail.

Once I find out what I am actually being charged for, I will come back and let you know.

Postofficehater

Hi,

We sent an e-mail enquiring about what we are been charged for and got the following responce:

Hi,

I have checked your invoice and it is correct, we are claiming 10 hours a week and then this term it is 11 weeks over the 4 months so we spread it out so you don’t have to pay in full during the half terms. Every term the grant will differ because of how many weeks are in each term so approx. every 4 months it may go a little up or down The grant is only an hourly rate of £3.40 which doesn’t match our hourly rate of £7.00 which is why it is used as a reduction. I hope this helps any further questions please feel free to chat to Kirsty upstairs or drop me another email.

Hope this helps

Kind Regards





Is this acceptable or can they not charge us for topping up their hourly rate?


Thanks again.


Rich.

susancs

Postofficehater wrote: »

Hi,

We sent an e-mail enquiring about what we are been charged for and got the following responce:

Hi,

I have checked your invoice and it is correct, we are claiming 10 hours a week and then this term it is 11 weeks over the 4 months so we spread it out so you don’t have to pay in full during the half terms. Every term the grant will differ because of how many weeks are in each term so approx. every 4 months it may go a little up or down The grant is only an hourly rate of £3.40 which doesn’t match our hourly rate of £7.00 which is why it is used as a reduction. I hope this helps any further questions please feel free to chat to Kirsty upstairs or drop me another email.

Hope this helps

Kind Regards





Is this acceptable or can they not charge us for topping up their hourly rate?


Thanks again.


Rich.

Rich,as stated before the Govt guidelines are that 15 hours have to be provided free of charge and your local authority Dept who deal with the Nursery funding will confirm this.

However, the hourly rate that is paid for the hours is so low in some areas, that they do not cover costs especially in private nurseries who have high operating costs due to longer opening hours, paying council business rates, high utility, insurance and building maintenance costs (community pre-schools, council and school nurseries usually pay low rent, share building and utlity costs with others using the premises ). The reason I say this is that it may not be financially viable to offer funded places and if you follow through with the local authority you may end up worse off if the nursery pull out of the scheme as you will pay full fees or you may have to look for alternative provision who do offer the scheme as it is supposed to operate, but it is more likely to be a 9am to 12pm term time only setting or be one where you are restricted on when you can use the hours. Unfair I know as the hours should be free, but just wanted to give you that information.

Here is a good article on how the scheme is subsidised or worked around in Nurseries who operate in correctly.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-32957950

Postofficehater

So according to that BBC report then, the email and invoice from them shows they are "illegally" charging top up fees.

When challenged, they may well come back with set hours etc but what they have given us so far at least gives us an argument.

Thanks again.

Rich.