Childcare Vouchers: cut childcare costs by £1,000/year Discussion Area

CAG8

There's been no mention so far, of the alternative to voucher schemes, which is a direct payment by an employer to the childcare provider. Provided the funds go straight to the provider, without entering the employee pay-packet then the tax saving can be made.

It works in exactly the same way as the vouchers for the employee - a salary sacrifice scheme for the gross amount, and hence the PAYE/NI saving. But for the employer, there is no fee to pay to a voucher company, so they save the employer NI in full. The only thing is, they have to keep admin records of the childcare providers, OFSTED reg no's etc etc in the payroll records, for inspections. It's not that difficult if it's only for a few staff members, though.

I persuaded my company and my husband's company to begin schemes, as they are both small companies, and didn't want to get involved with voucher companies. Also, we were the only employees for whom this would be relevant. They both agreed, and we are saving £160 a month between us in tax and NI. Very nice.

CAG8

For Tax credit calcs, you are supposed to show your pay after salary sacrifice, and the childcare you are paying, deducting what is paid by the vouchers. Technically, you could say that the portion of the invoice which is paid for by the vouchers is the debt of the employer, once it has been sacrificed by the employee. So it's not that they're having it both ways, it's that we're not allowed to.

Another reason could be that there's supposed to be quite a bit of admin with the schemes - maybe they're trying to wriggle out on technicalities, if schemes aren't being administered to the letter of the law.

onlyroz

sam1970 wrote: »

i am sorry if this has been asked before but i have been using busy bees for two years and i just remembered that my son is going to school in september so i have got now 7 vouchers (£243 each) which i did not use yet (as a result of some months being covered by the government grant for over 3 and other things).....will i be able to claim the money back (after taxation)...i really cant afford to lose nearly £1800 and the vouchers will be useless to me after august!!!

You won't be able to get the money back from the voucher company *but* you could pass the money onto the nursery and get the nursery to pay you back.

Alternatively, keep the vouchers in the scheme and use them to pay for after-school clubs after your child starts school.

QuackSave

Previous posts confirm that you are allowed to accumulate Childcare Vouchers from the birth of your child, ahead of them attending nursery (useful if nursery fees will exceed the monthly Childcare Voucher limit of £243 per working parent).

Therefore, it seems fair that any amount paid to your nursery in cash (due to Vouchers not covering the full costs) could be retrospectively claimed back as cash from the nursery in exchange for Childcare Vouchers once your child has left nursery.

Does anyone know if HMRC allows this, and if so, are nurseries this flexible?

(From next month I will be paying nursery fees of £930 per month, of which £486 is covered by the vouchers, so the potential additional savings in Income Tax and NICs on the £444 per month seem worth exploring).

Many thanks

QuackSave

onlyroz

QuackSave - not entirely sure what you're asking, but I know that nurseries will (at their own discretion) repay overpaid vouchers. When my son left his previous nursery we received back about £250 that we'd overpaid by.

guyrobinson

Hi all,

I have just finished 5 years of paying out nursery fees for both daughters. I have only just found out about these vouchers.
Is it possible to 'back claim' any money or tax etc etc at all !?!? Or should i just go and strangle my accountant now for not telling me !

Yours hopefully,

Guy

Danidollar

Hi everyone,
We are paying childcare of £606pm for a 9 month old and getting CTC of £250pm. My partner changed jobs in June to £30k which will take us over the £40k household income for CTC purposes for next year (i think). Therefore I am trying to figure out if we will be better/worse off taking salary sacrafice childcare vouchers (£243 each).
Do you think that we will be better off claiming for these around next tax year when partners new income will push us over the threshold. I have looked at various calculators but because CTC are based on 07/08 income and we are now on higher income, I am getting confused. Can anyone help?
Thanks,
Danidallor

pingua

Please I am sooooo confused. I 'work' for my hubsband -although I do not get paid !!!! Well you know, it all goes in the same pot. But no pay slips etc.
we pay about £240 to nursery. Is he able to get these vouchers for us, how do we do this and what do we need to do ??

Any other self employed husband/employed by husband wife people out there who have done this??

dougalputt

Hi everyone, hoping someone can help me.

I am going to take up the voucher scheme but have the option of putting it through my own salary or my partners. My partner only works 2 days a week and therefore isn't far over the 'band one free tax' allowance.

Am I correct in saying that if she were to get the vouchers through her work then that would possibly drop her 'taxable' salary to below the free tax allowance threshold and therefore she wouldn't get taxed at all?

If I were to take out the vouchers I wouldn't 'fall' to below the next tax band down so it might not be worth as much me doing it as it would for my partner??

Thanks for your help in advance!

Neil

teamworks2k

My experience with the Busy Bees system has not been a good one.
(There are many others to chose from)
I will stick to the facts:
The Busy Bees system runs in a Java applet window which overides all other open windows.
The system is not usualy accessable between the hours of eight and eleven PM. (Due to daily maintenance?)
In order for the system to work you must install the java application.
In order to access their system I have to turn off all my security features i.e.
Firewall, Antivirus and all popup blockers.
Once logged on the system it is very slow, for example to type in a user name and password I have to type a single letter and then wait for it to appear on the screen before I continue.
Intitial registration took 2 months despite taking our money in the first month.
I complained about the system and was first told that it is not accessable between 8 and 11 as this is when they maintain the system. Secondly I was assured that the system would be upgarded in the near future.
Since a recent upgrade I have not been able to access our money for 2 months.
All of the above applies to 6 computers in different locations using a variety of different web browsers including firefox, Window Internet Explorer and more recently Google Chrome.
Once I have retrieved my money I will switch.