Shocked by nursery prices

Sounds about right for my area (we’re in Croydon) it’s crazy 🥴

Short day 9-4 is £47 and a full day 8-6 is £64 at ours. We can only send him one day a week 9-4 atm though as that’s the only place they have available but we’re on the list for other days. The prices include meals and consumables but we get it all covered under the 15 funded hours as we’re only using 7 so it’s completely free for us right now but once we increase the days we’ll have to pay a little bit towards it but you can claim up to 85% of the payment above the funded hours back through Universal Credit

Unfortunately, this is the only way most nurseries can survive as the money given by the government for funded spaces isn't enough to cover staff wages/overheads. Have you set up a tax free child care account?

That’s insane! My kids go to a YMCA nursery with funded hours and we only pay £10 a month for food etc

Yup. Around about.. It's 84 for a full day in the place my step son goes to. He's 4 so is entitled to 30hrs but we actually can't use all of his entitlement because of the price of the wraparound care!. It's different in a local authority run one, but the only issue with those is that they are often only open 9-3 which if you work is no good! I'd recommend setting up and using the tax free childcare account ASAP as you do get a little bit back. Especially when the fees are high! However, we went to see one that stretched the hours further with less wraparound fees the other day. It was filthy and very very run down and we realised what we pay for and now new baby will be going to the same place despite the cost!

I paid £626.50 for three days a week for a month X

Thanks - we do have tax free childcare to claim some back. I didn’t expect to be paying £550 this month for one day a week 😢 plus meals

Wow. We are in Manchester and we pay £58 for a full day £4 per meal if using free hours only otherwise it’s included in the full day price. It’s an outstanding rated nursery too

We pay £775 a month for 3 days a week and that includes the 15 free hours 😣

My bill is £1000 for 4 days a week, even after 30 funded hours. It’s insane. But yes in general a full day is cheaper than two half days, but that does sound expensive for food. What meals are they getting? Mine is £12 a day for food. Plus the hours are only term time, so if your child is full time your 30 funded hours turns to about 18.

Crazy. Childminders around us don't charge any extra for food. So once you get your 30 hours if you do 10 hour days you get 3 days fully covered. Seems to mostly be nurseries still charging through the nose.

@Jess I think nurseries do it because they only get the bare minimum from the government which barely even covers a nursery nurse then they still have to employ support staff for those days so charging for food a way of supporting those costs. Although granted ours doesn’t charge this much.

Oh wow that is a lot! Our first month with the 15 hours has just come through and it’s £570 for 3 full days a week with 3 meals and 3 snacks x

Thanks all - It sounds like we’re getting charged a lot but it’s not that unreasonable/ abnormal

15 hours is not even 1.5 days a week for most nurseries if you use it term time. If you spread it over 12 months then it may be around 1 day per week so it helps but only makes a slight dent

We have worked out that to take the 15 hours, our boy will need to double his time in nursery and we will end up paying more. Not sure we’re going to use it.

I live in Buckinghamshire. Around here it’s around £80-£90 for a full day x

I've been quoted £862 (that includes 15 funded hours a week) for 4 full days at nursery (that includes food) shocking!

We pay £3800 for 2 kids full time for 5 days. No funding 🥲

@Hazel how many days ? X

Yup - tbh my nursery charge £7 But also i think.. you are misunderatanding this. Its not £10 a day for half a day of food. . . They are actually keeping your kid comfy alive and entertained. The funded hours is just for the hours nothing else. Nappies wipes etc.. They are the most precious thing in the world - and unfortunately i think the pricetag reflects that. Nursery fees for 4 days a week is 38% of my income. And i consider myself hugely lucky with that.

Also independent nurseries.. i think are better value than chains.

Yes ! We were paying £240 for 1 day a week, now we have 15 hours free we’ve put him in for 2 days but we’re still paying £185 a month 🫤

The cost the government pay is only for the term time, not a full 52 weeks of the year. And it's also for the childcare, not food, cost of keeping the lights on.

@Louise Why would that be different to childminders? Regulation is the same...

@Jess childminders will still get bare minimum per place but they don’t usually employ extra staff like cooks and cleaners so they have less staff to pay with the money they get. Our nursery employ 1 cook 1 cleaner 2 extra floating staff so that if any staff are off sick it doesn’t affect their ratios so they don’t have to close any classes plus an admin person.

The nursery is only open term time so the funding is totally applied to each week