Help/Advice Needed On Costings For Secondary School??

Penny-Pincher!!

Update-

Received pack this morning and the uniform is going to be more than expected and am really worried:eek:

She also needs soccer boots, shin pads, and some other stuff. Everything has to be bought through a special shop. The blazer is £148, skirts £51, blouses x 2 £19 each Long sleeve shirt £22, V Neck jumper £39, Netball skirt £22, Gym knickers £16, Outside PE shorts £19, PE T-shirt £22, PE Sweatshirt £28, Shin pads £22, Soccer boots £35, Gym shoes £12, Trainers ? £20, special socks £15, tie £19...some more bits, but these alone total £528:eek: Thats only 1 skirt too.

Will receive £67.50 from council and will have to go cap in hand to family members. We have never asked for anything, but think we are going to need it..LOL. If we dont then it will go on the 0% credit card.

PP
xx

Js_Other_Half

Have you thought any more about approaching social services for advice? I know of several charities who will only give money anonymously via the child's social worker/community care officer.

Good luck with it all.

juno

mountainofdebt wrote:

I simply phone the school, ask for one and they sent it to me by post.

1st time I did this, my son had the shock of his life - and it made very interesting reading!

Not so valid now as he has a packed lunch, which he seems to prefer.

My school had those, and everyone had "ice creams" on their reports when they actually hadn't bought any! For some reason if you bought anything from not the canteen it came up as an ice cream. So just check that there isn't anything like that before you think he has an unhealthy diet!

And also money had a strange habit of disappearing off cards. It was only pennies at a time, but it soon added up.

juno

Penny-Pincher!! wrote:

Update-

Received pack this morning and the uniform is going to be more than expected and am really worried:eek:

She also needs soccer boots, shin pads, and some other stuff. Everything has to be bought through a special shop. The blazer is £148, skirts £51, blouses x 2 £19 each Long sleeve shirt £22, V Neck jumper £39, Netball skirt £22, Gym knickers £16, Outside PE shorts £19, PE T-shirt £22, PE Sweatshirt £28, Shin pads £22, Soccer boots £35, Gym shoes £12, Trainers ? £20, special socks £15, tie £19...some more bits, but these alone total £528:eek: Thats only 1 skirt too.

Will receive £67.50 from council and will have to go cap in hand to family members. We have never asked for anything, but think we are going to need it..LOL. If we dont then it will go on the 0% credit card.

PP
xx

With that, can you find out when she's doing certain sports? Like she might not be doing gym til the summer, and we didn't need hockey boots til year 8.

Katgoddess

Will she really need a long sleeved blouse? We had one on our uniform list but in winter we wore jumpers over the top so it didn't matter if we wore a short one. If she does need one it can wait till it gets colder.

Have a look around local jumble sales, esp ones for the feeder primary schools.

You can search ebay for items located within 10 miles. Might be worth keeping an eye out for stuff?

Get hubby to do some matched betting.

Penny-Pincher!!

The only item which is not needed till Spring are the gym shoes. Everything else is a must. The long sleeved shirt has to be bought for social occasions, school photographs and the year book:mad:

I havent asked social services, how do I go about doing this

Thanks for the comments so far.

PP
xx

Edinburghlass_2

Surely a soccer boot is a soccer boot wherever you buy it and a shin pad wouldn't be seen.

Have a search on Ebay when you are listing your own goods and if you start now with putting away the £50 a month that you suggested, you woiuld be half way there.

aliasojo

Edinburghlass wrote:

Surely a soccer boot is a soccer boot wherever you buy it and a shin pad wouldn't be seen.

Well seeing you're not the parent of a footballer. :rotfl:

No useful advice to offer the OP, just wanted to say I empathise. It's hard enought trying to kit your child out when you're only dealing with their wants, let alone when you're given a guideline list!

Well done to your daughter......and well done to you for being the one who is striving to make it possible for her to have what she needs..

Glad

maybe it's a question of priority PP
could the kitchen refit be put off to buy the school essentials?

I would buy only the bare minimum until she has started, the school try to say it all has to be just so but when she gets there you may find that they don't actually check everyones shirt label to see if it's the correct one

the football boots must be one of the well known sports names, the school won't have their own make, so find out what it is and look in one of the discount sports shops

as for social services, can't you approach the dept that deals with your cleaner, stairlift, bathroom and heating benefits and ask them to point you in the right direction,

I know you do very well on ebay, sometimes £300 a month so you must be a good seller, is there anything alse you could sell to put some of this money aside for the uniform? maybe things your daughter has grown out of, or if you spend a lot of time on there maybe you could pick up some bargains to sell on for a profit

good luck

Savvy_Sue

And does the school not have a second hand shop? Surely at those prices they must?