prime time nursery - Not refunding the money

rajakumar

I’m using prime time nursery,Edinburgh for my son where I paid initially 268£ in child vouchers and they asked me to set a direct debit for their security which I did.
My son attended only 2 half day sessions and he didn’t continue after that.
In the mean time the nursery has taken £910 from the direct debit I have set. They have to refund £1128 excess money they have taken.

When tried calling them she said she will pay next week but never paid. It more than a month now, she has not refunded.

I even said that I will take legal action then also she is reluctant to pay the money.
If I have to take legal action against, can anyone guide me what I should do?

Thanks in advance.

alwaysonthego_2

I would go to the CAB for advice, but you probably could pursue through small claims court

Nicki

How much notice were you required under your contract to give? You will almost certainly have been charged the normal rate for the full amount of the notice period irrespective of whether your child attended or not. You may well find that this accounts for all or a very large part of what you think is the overpayment.

In the meantime, make sure that you cancel the DD mandate now so that no more money can be taken. In future whenever you cancel services, you should also cancel any related DD mandate so that this can't happen.

deanos

rajakumar wrote: »

My son attended only 2 half day sessions and he didn’t continue after that.

It dosent matter if he is there or not they will still charge you for the space until the notice period is up, everything should be in the contract you signed.

fudgeukraine

Did you cancel the contract after the 2 half day sessions? if you didn't then I'm afraid it sounds like you might have a slightly harder way of recovering the cash. Good luck anyway

lynneinjapan

As others have said, the number of days your child attended is immaterial - normal practice is that you pay the agreed rate until you cancel or change the contract in writing, and you must give 4 weeks' or a month's notice (depending on the contract terms) of when you want the change to become effective. You will therefore be expected to keep paying fees at the agreed rate until 4 weeks (or a month) after the nursery received your written notice of cancellation.

If what they've taken amounts to more than that then you should be entitled to a partial refund, but if you haven't actually written to them to cancel the contract then legally they are still providing a place for your child and therefore you should still be paying them even now.

rajakumar

Thanks for the responses.

Just to give you a detail insight.

I haven’t signed any contract. Initially we left our child for settlement and he has not settled at all. The 2 half day I mentioned was after the settlement and we brought him home after 2 hrs as he didn’t settle there. The nursery asked us to give us the dates our kid will be in and ask us to pay for it. So Initally before leaving our child we listed out the dates and paid in child care vouchers for £268. They asked us to sign for the DD for security reason which we did. They took £910 through DD after 10 days.

My point is I haven’t signed any contract and didn’t inform in writing that my kid will be starting full time. I reckon worst case the nursery can take £268 but they should definitely refund the £910 they have taken through DD. Can you agree on my comments? Is it worth to go to small claims court?

deanos

If you paid by direct debit then ring your bank and use the direct debit guarantee to get the cash back

smcaul

I agree with Deanos, if it was a DD and not a standing order just ring the bank, tell them it was an unauthorised amount and watch it appear back in your account the next working day - one of the best things about DD is this feature. Much quicker then trying to get it back from the Nursery.