Wrap around care help

Cleather4

Hello, this is a long one so stay with me! My children’s school have increased their fees for Breakfast club (BC) recently by 20% whilst also increasing other fees by 5-10% . They invited concerns so I raised a concern on how this will affect multi children households whose children go to BC year round . I asked them to review and see if a discount could be offered on siblings or year round commitment. They came back without an answer and said they are the lowest cost BC in the area, to which the opposite is true on a cost to time ratio, so I asked for their evidence for this statement. I also provided evidence of how they are actually the most expensive in the area. They then passed this on to the Governors who again didn’t answer my question but replied to me about after school club (which was not my query) , I asked again and she came back and said no discounts available. Ok that is fine however whilst researching the topic, I do not believe they are compliant with School food standards (they only provide cereal and no fruit, the SFS is ambiguous as to wether fruit must me provided at BC). The charging and remissions policy for schools also states that cost can not exceed the cost to run the provision, am I within my rights to ask for a breakdown of the fee per day as to how this is calculated? The fees must also not subsidise non payers or those that get a free space. 

Furthermore the person at the school told me my concern was shared at the Governors meeting so if I make a formal complaint on the handling of my concern (took 9 lengthy emails to get a response to my original question) it is now unable to be reviewed by a panel of Governors without prior knowledge of the situation. 

Any advice would be much appreciated! 

Cleather4

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No my concern is the fact they have not taken my query seriously or even had the thought to look at it (whilst inviting concerns to be made) exploiting the parents by Willy nilly changing their prices / services offered. I support their club my paying almost £2,000 a year as it is , there are no other choices for families to be able to go to work. I have paid almost £2,000 a year for the last 5 years and have not complained when they reduced their offerings over the years to now just cereal which is not nutritious nor have any variance. Do you not think they should be held accountable for making false statements or at least challenged on their statements ? Or is it ok they can make misleading statements to parents to further their financial gains ?

Emmia

Cleather4 said:

(Removed by Forum Team)

No my concern is the fact they have not taken my query seriously or even had the thought to look at it (whilst inviting concerns to be made) exploiting the parents by Willy nilly changing their prices / services offered. I support their club my paying almost £2,000 a year as it is , there are no other choices for families to be able to go to work. I have paid almost £2,000 a year for the last 5 years and have not complained when they reduced their offerings over the years to now just cereal which is not nutritious nor have any variance. Do you not think they should be held accountable for making false statements or at least challenged on their statements ? Or is it ok they can make misleading statements to parents to further their financial gains ?

Do you have the option of providing breakfast yourself at home, and your children not attending breakfast club... Presumably you're using the BC to allow you to get to work on time etc.

I doubt the BC is making money, by the time they've paid the staff, bought the food etc.

Cleather4

Emmia said:

Cleather4 said:

sammyjammy said:

My advice would be leave the poor beggars alone, its a thankless task, if you don't like it send your kids somewhere else.  What do you hope to achieve by complaining that they don't do fruit?  Shut the whole thing down so no kids can go to BC?

No my concern is the fact they have not taken my query seriously or even had the thought to look at it (whilst inviting concerns to be made) exploiting the parents by Willy nilly changing their prices / services offered. I support their club my paying almost £2,000 a year as it is , there are no other choices for families to be able to go to work. I have paid almost £2,000 a year for the last 5 years and have not complained when they reduced their offerings over the years to now just cereal which is not nutritious nor have any variance. Do you not think they should be held accountable for making false statements or at least challenged on their statements ? Or is it ok they can make misleading statements to parents to further their financial gains ?

Do you have the option of providing breakfast yourself at home, and your children not attending breakfast club... Presumably you're using the BC to allow you to get to work on time etc.

I doubt the BC is making money, by the time they've paid the staff, bought the food etc.

Yes they do have breakfast in advance as they don’t like having the same bowl of cereal every day ! Yes I do use it to go to work, I would have presumed they weren’t making money until I had done a cost comparison and found in more than 50% of cases they are over double the cost , I.e charging £5 per child for 30 mins whereas others in the area charge £5-6 for 60-70 mins , with others also providing cereal, toast and fruit in all cases. I have asked for an explanation of why there are these massive differences and have been told ‘we are the lowest cost in the area’ but I haven’t found any evidence to support that, just had an email back about after school club (I had not queried after school club). Do you think I am being unreasonable in asking for an explanation? I do feel I am pushing them for answers but obviously I am directly affected by this and other points of view are not , so interested to see! 

I had also mentioned that there are no other alternatives or child minders who do the drop off. But if I could find an alternative solution then the school would lose near enough £2000 a year from mine alone not going, and it wouldn’t not be ideal for me. So I feel both myself and the school would lose in that situation!