What to put for childcare costs?

amcraig

OK - bear with me while I try and explain...

Tax credit renewal came through. It's set me thinking about my childcare costs.

My problem is that my daughter starts school in Aug. So, I'll not be paying her nursery fees but I will probably need to use some holiday club type childcare. At the moment I have no idea how much or how much it's going to cost me (never having done it before).

I guess my question is in 2 parts:

1) Should I be phoning the HMRC now to tell them my childcare costs are changing from Aug? It's not clear to me when I should recalculate the yearly average. Does it run from April to April?

2) How do others cope with the holiday club uncertainty bit? Do I do a calculation and hope for the best? I don't want to end up in the situation where I have to pay for 2 weeks holiday care at £100 a week and not be able to recoup some of this because it doesn't last for the 4 weeks in a row.

Thank you.

Rince

Good question. I've got to put an amount as well for Childcare costs and I am unsure what to put. I have 2 children at nursery at the moment but my son starts school in sept and my daughter will be going an extra day from sept, so do I tell them what it is now and then phone again in Sept, or tell them the average for the next 12 months ? Also, i'll be in same situation as the poster above, with holiday club. Any advice would be great. Thanks.

Amistoso_2

you need to put in what you pay now and do a change of circs as and when they happen

Lucee

TC will not take the change yet as it hasn't happened. Ring them when it does and then they will start paying your new rate after the change has lasted for 4 weeks.

My 3 children go to a childminder and I pay different amounts during term time and holidays (not to mention the childminders 4 weeks holiday at half pay!).

When my childcare changed (my youngest started school) I rang them up then to tell them of the decrease in my average childcare per week, I then kept the old rate for 4 weeks and then started receiving the new rate. They way I calculated my average costs was take xx.xx during term time (x 39 weeks) xxx.xx during holidays (x 9 weeks) and xx.xx during the childminder holidays (x 4 weeks) I added all the costs up and then divided by 52 weeks to get my average childcare costs.

Then during the year if my childcare changes and I pay more or less I do the same calculation to make sure that the average costs haven't changed by more than £10.00 per week.

It is complicated but once you get used to it it becomes easier.

I would ring them once you start your new arrangements and how much it is going to cost you.

Lucee x

dizzyblonde82

I am in the same position as my son is starting school in September, I spoke to the Tax Credits about this yesterday and they advised to put my current average weekly nursery costs and then call up at the start of september to give updated costs for after school club/holiday clubs.