does anyone understand free funded nursery placements?

sarahs999

I gave up trying to understand it all. My son's just started school but at nursery he got 15 hours a week funded, which wasn't enough to cover his attendance. I still had to p ay everything up front, but then once a term I'd get a cheque back which was worked out assuming his attendance over the whole year (the problem is that the authorities only fund for 38 weeks of the year, not 'holidays' which is crazy of course as the kids still need to be looked after in holiday time)... so the nursery worked out the average weekly amount over the year and gave it back in cheque form. Many weeks after we'd paid. So it didn't really helpa t all in terms of cashflow, I have to say.

cclarke12

Triggles wrote: »

Instead of charging her £35 for the day minus the amount of the free funding, they insist they must bill her for £25 for each of the 3 days as that is the "half day" fee, even though he is there for the full day.

They are being paid by the hour for the actual hours that the child is using. They are getting around this by saying the child gets one free session per day (the morning or the afternoon) and that they have to pay for the other one, and that the session cost is £25. They are not paid on sessions anymore they are paid by the hour. I think they probably can apply it they are doing but it seems unfair.

The reason they are probably doing is that some children might only be attending for half day sessions of 5 hours which parents can have 3 free of charge (if 15 hours is in place in that area). In practice they get paid about £3.25 per hour by the local authority, so for the child only doing 3 half days sessions they are making a loss against what they would charge directly to a parent (£16.25 versus £25). The guidance from DCSF is that the 15 hours are free and if a parent only uses these hours you cannot charge them anything in addition (except for meals/snacks etc), so the nursery makes a loss on these children. Therefore, I suspect they may try to recoup their losses by applying the discount on full-time days in the way they have for your daughter. Some nurseries aren’t interested in taking children for just the free provision as it just isn’t viable for them.

Marcheline

My understanding is in line with what cclarke is saying at the top of this page. Following on from their post, see here under the 'Find your FIS' tab http://www.familyinformationservices.org.uk/ to find your local branch. I have used my council's one in the past and I found them to be very helpful!

SKIPPY

sarahs999 wrote: »

I gave up trying to understand it all. My son's just started school but at nursery he got 15 hours a week funded, which wasn't enough to cover his attendance. I still had to p ay everything up front, but then once a term I'd get a cheque back which was worked out assuming his attendance over the whole year (the problem is that the authorities only fund for 38 weeks of the year, not 'holidays' which is crazy of course as the kids still need to be looked after in holiday time)... so the nursery worked out the average weekly amount over the year and gave it back in cheque form. Many weeks after we'd paid. So it didn't really helpa t all in terms of cashflow, I have to say.

They definately should not do this, the nursery receives half the money about a week or two into the first half term and the second half just before the second half of the term or a week into it, so if you are paying your invoices monthly, they appear to be holding onto money which is rightfully yours. They should deduct it straight away.

SKIPPY

Anthillmob wrote: »

my kids go to private nursery all day thursday and all day friday.

we arrive between 8-8.30am dependant on the busses and i pick them up at 5pm.

forgetting boris, can anyone make sense of whats going on with chops who gets the free placement?

every time i enquire about anything with nursery i get a confusing bundle of words.

they make me laugh. they have recently over the past 2 months been callijg saying i owe them such and such after paying the monthly fees which i have scraped together and paid to get us straight and owe nothing and then it turns out that i have to give them over £600 this month because we owe them for last month.

ive looked at the print outs of their accounts today for a long time, got a stress headache, neck pains from stress but if my maths is correct then it looks as though they are right.

so why not tell me the first time you said i owed. id rather be straight than get walloped like i have been, esp when i was told we were clear on both accounts.

all to be paid by 01/10/09. they can whistle, we dont have that kind of money to spar atm due to the 2 weeks out of work mr mob had. i can only payt them boris' fees and then chops when i manage to screape the rest together.

They should be able to supply you with a fee structure!!! so it should be quite easy to work out. What do the nursery class as a full day, my nursery is open from 7.30 - 6.00 so if you booked your child in on a full day that is what you pay for regardless of if you drop your child off later or picked them up earlier.

So as I said earlier if you are in an area where the grant is upto 15 hours, as your child only attends over two days you can only claim 13 hours, so on Thursday the nursery should apply 10 hours of the grant to your day and you pay the remainder if anything. Then they should apply the remaining three hours to the Friday and then you pay the remainder. They may also charge for meals etc on top of this but are not able to charge 'top up' fees.

On the other hand if it is still only 5 x 2.5 hours sessions, you will be entitled to 4 sessions per week, so it works out to approx £16.00 per week off your weekly bill.

The new system is better for parents but not so good for settings. I'd definately give your Early Years a call to find out what grant the nurseries in your area do get, doesn't sound like you nursery is being very helpful.

cclarke12

SKIPPY wrote: »

They definately should not do this, the nursery receives half the money about a week or two into the first half term and the second half just before the second half of the term or a week into it, so if you are paying your invoices monthly, they appear to be holding onto money which is rightfully yours. They should deduct it straight away.

Unless the local authority are slow in paying........... My setting has still not received this term's funding, and the monthly fees are due at the end of next week. We have been told this morning that we will have to pay the full fees this month and they they will give us a cheque back when the grant comes in. Bit of a pain but I understand where they are coming from and I guess if you have staff and overheads to pay you can't subsidise 40 odd parents for a month if you haven't been paid the money by the local authority :mad: I can see some private providers pulling out of delivering the free hours all together. If my nursery stopped offering the free bours I would still have to stay with them as nobody else very locally offers the flexibility and hours they do.

sarahs999

They can't pull out, can they? It's a legal thing - all kids have to be offered a certain amount of free nursery time?

cclarke12

sarahs999 wrote: »

They can't pull out, can they? It's a legal thing - all kids have to be offered a certain amount of free nursery time?

Providers don't have to deliver the free early years entitlement if they don't want to. Most do because they think it is a good thing and it is a way of attracting children/parents to the setting. Children are legally entitled to have the entitlement but nurseries don't have to offer it if they don't want to. However, the local authority has a duty to ensure there is enough free provision out there for people that want to use it. In practice, schools and community/voluntary sector providers would be very unlikely to ever pull out of delivering it. However, I could see the possibility of some private sector providers saying they don't want to deliver it anymore as it is too much hassle and that the grant is not covering the actual costs of delivering the 12.5 or 15 bours.

mrcow

Anthillmob wrote: »

my kids go to private nursery all day thursday and all day friday.

we arrive between 8-8.30am dependant on the busses and i pick them up at 5pm.

forgetting boris, can anyone make sense of whats going on with chops who gets the free

So what you are paying for essentially is something like:

From 8-9am each day (ask how much that is - probably £4 or so?)
From 11.30-1pm each day or thereabouts (again - ask how much)
From 3.30 until 5pm each day

So you are paying for 4 hours each day and are getting 5 hours paid for you.

But........the funding only covers 38 weeks of the year (so 12 weeks or so per term) - many terms are more than this if the nursery is eg. open during half terms etc.

So for some weeks - you could be needing to pay for the whole 9 hours each day if the weeks fall outside the 38 week funding.

Many nurseries try to help out parents by working out the amount owed for the whole term and then dividing it up to give a monthly figure - but they should be able to provide a complete breakdown of what you owe and why.

longbaygirl

Can someone explain to me when the funding starts.

My son was 3 in Nov 2008, but the funding at nursery did not start till April 2009.

I thought the 'term following the 3rd birthday' would be January? Have I got it wrong or have the nursery?

I do know that where we are in London we get £610 per term, per child.