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

credit_crunch_dad

Hi, Everyone needs these vouchers - big or small. For name sake, I earn a salary but we cannot afford to put our child in nursery even for a few hours a week. Other people in banks have made losses and got multi million pound rewards - but some of the good hard working people never got anything. We need to trust each other and work together to save these child care vouchers.

rjayne

surreysaver wrote: »

Just logged onto the new Computershare site - it looks a mess. They no longer advertise a freephone number, it is difficult to contact them electronically - they only have an e-mail address rather than a contact form. The dates of previously issued vouchers are all wrong.

Busy Bees were bad, but this lot of buffoons look worse.

I am an employer and have spent the last two days trying to contact them, I have been on hold for at least 30mins each time before I've had to hang up and try again later.

We received our schedule which you now have to approve before they send out an invoice and it was totally wrong. I emailed them to let them know a week ago but had no reply. I emailed again as yesterday was the day we pay our invoices and still nothing. Now it is too late for us to pay in time for employees to receive their vouchers at their usual time.

This will put employers off running the scheme (if it continues anyway).

I will certainly be looking to change providers as this is a shambles.

rjayne

I just logged on to Twitter and sent the MD a sarcy message lol, won't do any good but made me feel a bit better...... now on hold for 35 minutes!

Pipling

PlasticMan wrote: »

Hi Dollypop,

.

I'd rather they abolished the unfair voucher system (apparently a THIRD of the benefit for employer supported childcare goes to the 6% of parents who pay tax at the higher rate (i.e. the richer ones). Abolish the vouchers, put Computershare out of work and I'll take the tax credits (for low AND middle income parents) and free nursery places, thanks very much.

What exactly is unfair about the voucher system? The free nursery places are for children aged 2 ONLY - so you benefit for 1 year, IF you have a 2 year old, whereas the vouchers cover child care from birth to 13 years (at least). Our family would class as low to middle income, no where near the higher rate tax bracket and yet these vouchers save us nearly £2000 per year. I needed to go back to work after the birth of our 2nd child and I'm paying for 3 days nursery for my son and 3 days before and after school care for my daughter, plus holiday care. This would cost at the full rate nearly £7500 per year. The vouchers bring it down to £5,500 meaning that I just about have enough money to contribute to the household costs. If I'd not worked, OK we wouldn't have had to shell out on child care, but there would still be a shortfall in our income and because my husbands salary is slightly over the limit for the working tax credit, we wouldn't get any help that way.

For some families, the tax credit system works best for them and vouchers could lose them money, Martin has written about this on the site and so its best for them not to use the vouchers. For the rest of working parents, the vouchers work out better. How on earth can you say its not fair?! Whichever bracket you're in, there is a system to help with childcare costs. Aboloshing the vouchers - that can be used for up to 13 years of childcare - just to provide 1 YEAR of free care for 2 year olds? How the hell is that fair?

If the so-called problem from the governments perspective is that too many higher rate tax payers are using them, then why not cap the tax relief on the vouchers to the basic tax rate? i.e. higher rate tax payers only pay the difference in tax between the standard rate and the higher rate? That way, everyone still benefits from the vouchers system?

scootermacc

Hi. Does anyone know if the childcare voucher companies are regulated by a body such as the FSA? I have a need to complain against ComputerShare for unauthorised payment of vouchers to our carer and failure to retrieve the money after 30 days of complaining. I cannot find out from them who I can escalate it to - they are not dealing with the complaint satisfactorily. Can I approach the Financial Ombudsman maybe? Thanks, scott.

catz1ct

You should email their CEO. People always listen to him.

shibumi

The bursar at my childrens school has said that the rules for childcare voucher use are not very clear when it comes to max age to which they can be used.
Can anyone clarify this please?

The school say that the rules that stand at the moment allow the vouchers to be used up until 'compulsory school age' ie not beyond the term in which the child is 5. If this is true my daughter (february birthday) should be able to make use of the vouchers in the first two terms of her reception year at private school. This would be a substantial saving of about £2000 but I'm relauctant to keep paying in if this is not true.

Please help
Thanks

Savvy_Sue

shibumi wrote: »

The bursar at my childrens school has said that the rules for childcare voucher use are not very clear when it comes to max age to which they can be used.
Can anyone clarify this please?

The school say that the rules that stand at the moment allow the vouchers to be used up until 'compulsory school age' ie not beyond the term in which the child is 5. If this is true my daughter (february birthday) should be able to make use of the vouchers in the first two terms of her reception year at private school. This would be a substantial saving of about £2000 but I'm relauctant to keep paying in if this is not true.

Please help
Thanks

Since it is the school who will presumably be making the claim, surely the best person to ask for clarification is the school bursar? Will they, or will they not, accept vouchers as part payment of fees for part of the Reception year?

shibumi

Savvy_Sue wrote: »

Since it is the school who will presumably be making the claim, surely the best person to ask for clarification is the school bursar? Will they, or will they not, accept vouchers as part payment of fees for part of the Reception year?

Thats what I am trying to get in writing before I commit to buying the vouchers. The bursar is very reluctant to agree anything and her loose interpretation of the rules are that as long as the nursery grant is applicable so are the childcare vouchers....lets just hope the rule don't change or the bursar does not change his mind!

Ama

shibumi wrote: »

The bursar at my childrens school has said that the rules for childcare voucher use are not very clear when it comes to max age to which they can be used.
Can anyone clarify this please?

The school say that the rules that stand at the moment allow the vouchers to be used up until 'compulsory school age' ie not beyond the term in which the child is 5. If this is true my daughter (february birthday) should be able to make use of the vouchers in the first two terms of her reception year at private school. This would be a substantial saving of about £2000 but I'm relauctant to keep paying in if this is not true.

Please help
Thanks

Childcare vouchers can be used up until your child turns 16. You cannot use childcare vouchers for school fees.