Teachers not getting childcare vouchers discussion

Rachel130171

Curtlyb

You obviously do not know any teachers currently employed in schools. While we do get final salary scheme pension at the moment, so do many other companies. It is unlikely that our final salary will be anything like that earned by professionals in other fields, despite many years of hard work!

As for 13 weeks holiday. I do not know any teacher who currently enjoys this luxury. We use much of this non contact time to prepare lessons, sort out and make resources, mark and assess work, write at least 2 A4 sides of annual report for each of the 30 or so children in our class!

We also get penalised by the holiday companies who decide to inflate their prices by horrendous amounts during teachers enforced holiday dates, so that if we do dare to take a holiday it can cost us 3 or 4 times as much as other people who can go in term time.

Despite all this I feel you are missing the point of this thread in that we are trying to get teachers an equal right to claim government subsidies as every other employed person in the country. This I feel is not too unreasonable to expect!

themaccas

There are plenty of other government employees that do not get the vouchers either. My child goes to a nursery that belongs to and is administered by the Armed Forces. Although I am entitled to vouchers through my employer, the nursery will not accept them because their accounts are maintained through the armed forces and they have chosen not to participate in the scheme either, no member of the armed forces is able to get these childcare vouchers, that represents a very large number of employees that are ineligible. It seems to me that through setting up the childcare vouchers scheme, the government has ignored it's own employees.

curtlyb

Hi Rachel130171,

Can I just take this opportunity to apologise for any offence generated by my post, obviously, as you can see from the liberal use of emoticons, it was meant to be a light-hearted / tongue-in-cheek post. This thread does have a serious point but i do sometimes have a quiet smirk to myself when reading about people pushing their own cause without thought for others, why are people not asking their MP’s for the tax break to be compulsory and allowed for every employee, 90% of private companies will not entertain the scheme, they are either just too small to make it efficient or can’t be bothered, is that fair ? My company of 115 employees laughed in my face when I asked them to implement the perk, please don’t think that the government is singling you out !!!

As for the ‘teacher’ side of things I have half a dozen of my closest friends who are teachers and, forgive me for offending, the profession is generally the topic of conversion when in a social group. My best friend is a head teacher of a primary school (earning £48k) and his wife is a year 5 teacher (earning £32k), to be brutally honest he makes sure he has his 14 weeks hols a year, both he and his wife have their 6 ½ weeks in July/August in France and take pride in not taking or thinking about work until driving back up the M1 ! I’m not saying they are wrong or the norm and I feel sorry for the hardworking teachers that do have to work bl**dy long hours to achieve their goals but again employment in general is harder than its ever been.
Another friend is has just been to France again last week and arranged a teacher training ‘inset’ day to go and play golf on his return because he couldn’t fit it in the normal half-term ! One of my wife’s bridesmaids, a teacher, has just returned to work from maternity leave, she used to get £3800 a year for being a **** co-ordinator, somebody else took over the role permanently when she went on maternity, last week she was told that she can keep the £3800 even though she’s no longer doing the job because “we don’t like taking money off people”, nice one, nearly £80/wk for doing nothing, knocks your £25/wk childcare tax credit into a cocked hat me thinks !!!

As for pensions then I think that teachers should be careful what they say, having just successfully agreed with the government that current contributors can continue to retire at 60 I think that that is an extremely good agreement, I’m 37 and there’s absolutely no chance of any of my age range drawing their government pension until at least 68 and more probably 70-72. As for private company pension schemes, well, I will have you a £100 bet that within 8 years private final salary pensions will be stopped for both new AND current contributions for all but about half a dozen large companies (the likes of John Lewis Partnership etc etc) and most are contributory pensions (not avc’s) , my wife is still paying into a final salary pension scheme that she’s been told will probably be abandoned in two years !!!
We’re now in a situation where a friend of my fathers pays into a pension scheme for forty years with a projected annuity of around £15,200 a year and then is told 6wks from retirement that he’ll now be getting £2700 a year, I personally think its time for people in general to be a lot more grateful for what they’ve got !!!

My ‘head teacher’ mate has a bit of sympathy with the guy above, but its quite easy to do that when he’s estimating his own joint pension pot to be around £41,500 at 60 years old, in fairness to him, he admits that he’s quite happy with his lot and has no complaints, maybe a few more should follow his lead !

lynneinjapan

I wrote to my MP and got a reply telling me what had already been discussed in Parliament (can't remember what it said but it was the same transcript I'd already found on a website somewhere), and I think he said that he would pursue the issue.

I actually teach at a sixth form college myself, and a few weeks after that an email came round asking if any staff would be interested in signing up for a childcare vouchers scheme. I had just found out that I was pregnant, but it was too early to public about it, and so I responded, "Does an expression of interest count if it comes from someone who doesn't have any children?" Anyway, they're going ahead with the scheme so I'm happy!

Rachel130171

CurtlyB

Interesting comments in your post. I wish I could work in the schools your teacher friends work in. I was paid a temporary ICT co-ordinator allowance for a year longer than originally agreed and despite still being ICT co-ordinator and working damn hard to trouble shoot and run the ICT department single handed am currently being made to repay the overpayments!! Tight or what!

It does seem bizarre that the Government are currently advertising for teachers to train and apparantly want experienced teachers to return to work after having families that they should make it illegal for teachers to claim tax relief on childcare.

Obviously some employers will not be taking part because of their size and some nurseries don't take vouchers. The whole thing seems like a complete mess and I agree it should be made compulsory for all employees no matter where they work!

curtlyb

Hi Rachel130171

Having to repay those overpayments is a scary situation, together with the fact that you're still doing the job, that just beggars belief. Why can't people just be paid to do what they do, end of story, i'm presuming this has all got to do with school budgets but then again thats yet another topic for a another day.

As for the credits, there is no excuse for any size of company not to implement the system, people like 'Accor' do all the work for them. You are right in saying everyone should be allowed.

Looking at 'lynneinjapan' 's post i think the tide could be changing, i just hope its not a case of 'whichever school/college that can be bothered' because this will just lead to further friction, i should know :rolleyes:

Like i said in my previous post, its the very hardworking employees who always seem to 'cop out' for certain others milking/abusing the system, i'll look into getting you a job, can you play golf

lynneinjapan

curtlyb wrote:

Looking at 'lynneinjapan' 's post i think the tide could be changing, i just hope its not a case of 'whichever school/college that can be bothered' because this will just lead to further friction, i should know :rolleyes:

I'm afraid my situation is a bit different, because we're only subject to the sixth form college teachers' pay agreement and not to the school teachers' pay agreement. I'm not sure why it should make any difference as far as childcare vouchers are concerned, but I think that subscribing to the pay agreement may be optional for sixth form colleges. And I'm employed by the college, not the local LEA, so that might make a difference too. I am in the same teachers' pension scheme as a school teacher, mind you!

I'm sure you're right though, the provision of childcare is bound to depend to some extent on whether the individual emplyer can be bothered.

Rachel130171

Curtlyb
Sadly I can't play golf! I sometimes wonder why I am still teaching, but I am not qualified to do any other job. Maybe one day I'll go for it and leave.


I am still amazed by how many people do not actually know about the whole vouchers thing. Great publicity by the govt! Perhaps if everyone started raising it , more employers and more nurseries would get involved. Here's hoping!!

Noah'strolly

I asked my LEA if they were doing vouchers a year ago and they said they were looking into it. Still nothing! In the meantime my husband's employer have set one up and it should be running next month.
I think its disgusting that a county council that runs pc schemes of all sorts (like the recycling collections, flexi time for countyhall staff and cashback for cloth nappies - which I aplaud them for) can't help their own educational employees through a time in their career when its hardly worth them working.
I returned to work after my first child, full time, on a basic teacher's pay (no points for the two subjects I coordinated). I paid £550 pcm in childcare. After my second child I couldn't afford two lots of fees but knew I would soon get a discount from nursery vouchers for 3 year olds. So I went back part time to keep my hand in and used one voucher to save £7 for each 1/2 day I worked. My eldest has now started school but I still pay £15 a day in before and after school care.
I can understand why some people with young children decide to leave work but once you do you can quickly get left behind and priced out of the market by low school budjets.
So we're just waiting for the day the nursery fees stop and we'll feel sooooo rich!
These accor vouchers should really help. If my LEA do introduce they can I claim as well as my husband?

lynneinjapan

Yes, both parents can take advantage of the voucher scheme.

My college was quite quick to get going on it too - they first put out feelers in December, asking how many people were interested (in fact it may even have been early Jan - all I know is that it was between when I found out I was pregnant and when I went public about it), and the vouchers are going to be available from this April. It's being administered by a company called Busy Bees, who also own a chain of nurseries, but the vouchers can be used anywhere that they're accepted.