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

wolvotim

Hi ya just wanted to ask a quick question because I cant work it out.

Here’s a little background on our situation.

I live with my fiance and her 6 year old daughter. My fiance doesn’t work and I work for e.on who provide child care vouchers. We receive no money from my fiances ex-husband in maintenance as he simply cannot afford it as he earns very little.

So apart from 70 quid a month child benefit which is paid to my fiance I run our house on my wage alone. We receive no tax credits of any form and I pay for 2 days of after school club in an ofted registered child care business which comes to 65 quid a month.

I’ve now been told by 2 people that even though im not the child’s parent/guardian I can claim these vouchers because I support the child. But I can find no evidence of this online everything seems to suggest that even thought I run our house and support everyone who live within it I don’t qualify for these vouchers.

Can anyone clear this up for me.

cosyc

wolvotim wrote: »

Hi ya just wanted to ask a quick question because I cant work it out.

Here’s a little background on our situation.

I live with my fiance and her 6 year old daughter. My fiance doesn’t work and I work for e.on who provide child care vouchers. We receive no money from my fiances ex-husband in maintenance as he simply cannot afford it as he earns very little.

So apart from 70 quid a month child benefit which is paid to my fiance I run our house on my wage alone. We receive no tax credits of any form and I pay for 2 days of after school club in an ofted registered child care business which comes to 65 quid a month.

I’ve now been told by 2 people that even though im not the child’s parent/guardian I can claim these vouchers because I support the child. But I can find no evidence of this online everything seems to suggest that even thought I run our house and support everyone who live within it I don’t qualify for these vouchers.

Can anyone clear this up for me.

It's not a case of qualifying for the vouchers. Your employer chooses whether they operate a childcare voucher scheme. If they do you can normally opt into the scheme but most will want you to sacrfice part of your salary in lieu.

For example - your salary is £1000 per month before tax. You decide you will take £200 per month in vouchers for a £200 cut in your wages. (you contract of employment will be amended it's not a deduction on your wage slip)

So your gross pay is now £800 and you pay tax and national insurance on £800 instead of £1000. So that is the benfit to you no tax and NI on that £200 and your employer saves NI on the same £200.

other query From HMRC guide E18 - http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/helpsheets/e18.pdf

The child for whom the childcare voucher is provided must be a child of the employee or a child who lives with the employee and for whom
he or she has parental responsibility.
• A child qualifies up to 1 September following
their 15th birthday or 1 September following their

16th birthday if he or she is disabled.

TAG

wolvotim wrote: »

Hi ya just wanted to ask a quick question because I cant work it out.

Here’s a little background on our situation.

I live with my fiance and her 6 year old daughter. My fiance doesn’t work and I work for e.on who provide child care vouchers. We receive no money from my fiances ex-husband in maintenance as he simply cannot afford it as he earns very little.

So apart from 70 quid a month child benefit which is paid to my fiance I run our house on my wage alone. We receive no tax credits of any form and I pay for 2 days of after school club in an ofted registered child care business which comes to 65 quid a month.

I’ve now been told by 2 people that even though im not the child’s parent/guardian I can claim these vouchers because I support the child. But I can find no evidence of this online everything seems to suggest that even thought I run our house and support everyone who live within it I don’t qualify for these vouchers.

Can anyone clear this up for me.

I don't know how many hours or how much you earn. But if it's under £50k, maybe a bit more, I can't quite remember you should at least be receiving the min £545 a year Child Tax Credit. Has your partner not claimed this?

ifonlyitwaseasier

wolvotim - you do qualify, if you are part of the childs household and provide for them then you do not need to be a blood relation, you are technically a step-parent as far as the scheme rules would go.

if you need any more info let me know i used to work for one of the big 3 voucher providers (idiotic company but nice people) and still have a lot of friends there.

surreysaver

teamworks2k wrote: »

My experience with the Busy Bees system has not been a good one.

Nor has mine. When I first applied for their vouchers, they couldn't tell me when they would start to be taken from my wages. The online voucher system is useless -I work nights, and would sort it out during the night, but their system is down all night! I asked them to send me details in the post about how everything works - but they refused. I complained about a year ago about the lack of knowledge and the fact vouchers hadn't been sorted out, and was told in a letter an investigation would be carried out - but never heard any more. And now their new log in sustem takes forever and you have to go through so many screens!

Honestly, if anybody's employer is starting to do childcare vouchers, AVOID BUSY BEES!

srobbo007uk

My company use PES Consulting for Childcare vouchers
they provide online and paper vouchers and I'm saving over £1000 a year
http://www.pesconsulting.co.uk/services/childcare.htm
www.pesconsulting.co.uk

Icequeen1

Childcare vouchers don't always work out good for some families who also claim help for childcare costs through tax credits. In fact some people will be worse off taking childcare vouchers because of the loss of tax credits.

A couple of people have recently realised this over on the benefits forum.

There are a series of articles talking about the dangers and what you should check before making the decision:

http://www.litrg.org.uk/news/index.cfm?id=599

IQ

Julesiep

Hi
My daughter is starting nursery next year and we are not entitled to any working family tax credit. Someone mentioned vouchers. My employer has a subsidise nursery which is not useful as it is near where I work miles from where I live. My husband's employer asked us to get the information to see if he could set a voucher scheme up. However it is only a small firm with six people working there therefore would he benefit from paying a company to do the vouchers for him. I tried to see if an employer can set their own scheme themselves and websites say they can but do not go into much depth. He will have to make vouchers as cash is not allowed how do these become offical vouchers? Does anyone have any experience of this? Please!

abby1234519

I need some help! Was looking on workingfamiles and doing calculations etc re tax credits if me and OH were to have a baby in the future...

when I put in that one of us would get the vouchers, it basically said we were worse off?? I earn 15k he earns 17k, I thought it would help us as I thought our combined salary wasn't a lot? argh someone explaiiiinnnn

scootermacc

AngeMac wrote: »

I have been told that with these child care vouchers, they can affect how much maternity pay you will get in the future because you are lowering the amount of national insurance that you pay while you use them? Is this correct? I have one child and will probably one day want to have another but don't want to be penalised later on?

Thanks

AngeMac

I posted this on another board previously, but its relevant here too:


Hi all.

There is new legislation in place that affects mothers WHO ALREADY HAVE A CHILD IN CHILDCARE AND ALREADY CLAIM VOUCHERS TO PAY FOR IT when they have a second (or more I guess) child.

The employer is liable to continue paying childcare vouchers during the period of maternity leave as the vouchers are classified as 'non-cash benefits', and non-cash benefits must be continued to be provided during maternity leave (this is the law).

This is done by salary sacrifice as normal on any pay made to the mother - but only that ABOVE statutory maternity pay. They are NOT allowed to use the statutory maternity pay itself as part of the salary sacrifice. So they have to pay the mother the statutory maternity pay AND pay the childcare vouchers, even though the mother has no pay to sacrifice! (Be careful - if the employer provides occupational maternity pay as well as statutory maternity pay, they CAN deduct the vouchers from this, just not the SMP).

Further, if the mother decides to take the extra 3 months UNPAID maternity leave they are legally entitled to (months 9 to 12), the employer STILL has to pay the childcare vouchers, even though the mother is being paid no money at all.

On the face of it the mother is entitled to have her employer pay for her childcare vouchers while she is on maternity leave, and this could be hundreds of pounds of childcare assistance that mothers can claim from their employers.

If the employer refuses to pay this, or tries to reduce your Statutory Maternity Pay by taking the voucher costs from the SMP, they are breaking the sex discrimination laws and can be prosecuted.

Here's a link to more reading on this: http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/employers/sml...-sacrifice.pdf

I've done some sums and spoken to Working Families on this too:
I believe we will be over £1000 better off during my wife's year of maternity leave, as a result of this legislation. This assumes that we would have continued to pay for the childcare costs for our first child from our own pocket during the upcoming maternity pay. Other people could be even better off, depending on the maternity pay rules applied by their employer.