[Closed] Childminders and Paying them through holidays

Sorry buddy, are you for real?

Standard practice. Its the same concept of you being paid during your annual leave at work.

She's on annual leave, and still gets paid.

You pay them X pounds a year to look after little Johnny. Five days free, 10 days half price etc., is all rubbish.

Just use the one number, then if you want to work it our per week divide by 52. Easy.

Matt

Depends what the contract is. Are you employer them directly or are they contracting the service to you?

I assume you are paying a "retainer" to prevent them going elsewhere?

She needs (targets) to earn £xx thousands of pounds a year. If you can find a childminder who doesn't charge for holidays, then she's either adding that money to your normal bill, or she's struggling for clients (read not very good).

So you just gotta suck it up!

Kryton57 - Member
Standard practice. Its the same concept of you being paid during your annual leave at work.

She's on annual leave, and still gets paid

Is the correct answer.

Kryton57 - Member
Standard practice. Its the same concept of you being paid during your annual leave at work.
She's on annual leave, and still gets paid
Is the correct answer.

Only if you are employed on that basis in the last 10 years working in the UK I was only paid holiday for 18months. The rest I was self employed and therefore had to sort that bit out myself.

Big difference between Employer/Employee and Hiring a contractor.

You don't pay your builder to have 2 weeks off in the middle of the job..

mikewsmith - Member
You don't pay your builder to have 2 weeks off in the middle of the job.

But we aren't talking about Builders, we are talking about child minders.

You don't pay your builder to have 2 weeks off in the middle of the job.

mikewsmith - Member
You don't pay your builder to have 2 weeks off in the middle of the job.
But we aren't talking about Builders, we are talking about child minders.

This is where i struggle to grasp it, surely she is self employed and thus if she cant provide a service she cant invoice for it. I would have thought we either pay when she is on holiday (x weeks per year) or if we decide not to use her?

There is no such thing as 'Standard Contract' for a childminder but there are several common terms. It is not uncommon for them to be paid (all or part) during holidays, to expect paid during your holidays, when your child is off sick or to want a retainer to cover the summer if you are a term time worker who doesn't need them during school hold etc.

As others have said though if you wanted to negotiate only to pay for the days you actually use them this is possible but they will just redistribute the cost onto your hourly/daily rate.

If you don't like it, find someone else. You're getting a cheap deal by using a childminder instead of a nursery in any case.

You could try looking after your child yourself, then you dont need to pay anyone.

Now i can kind of see where they are coming from with paying them while we are on holiday, but us paying the childminder while she goes away, is she taking the michael?

other childcare providers available

Starting to look into child minders for when my Wife goes back to work. As i understand it, you have to book them in advance and pay them for how many days a week you want them normally, if you actually use them or not? Seems cheaper than a nursery, any how.

We pay Au Pair when on holiday with us, or when we go on holiday and leave them at home.

Better to be generous imo.

this is why i don't have children. well this and the fact no woman wants me to sire a child with them 😥

We don't pay our childminder when she's on holiday.

How much does it cost you every week for a childminder, out of interest.

£550 a month here, 3 full days (10 hours), 1 x 8 hour day

We only use them two mornings a week to give my wife a break (have a 5month and 19month old) but did pay £480/month for 4 days.

Apparently the childminder has changed the contract to half pay when both parties are on holiday

£475 per month here for 4 days, 8-5

Apparently the childminder has changed the contract to half pay when both parties are on holiday

Never go on holiday yourself, that'll teach her

FWIW...my childminder charges nothing for her hols but specifies them on her yearly planner.

If we take hols she charges us half price as a place retainer kind of thing i guess.

If my child is ill we pay full price, including when he is in hospital.

Standard practice i thought to be fair.

we pay for 5 x 6.5hr days a week, £146.25 per week payable a month in advance.

Do you still pay your rent/mortgage when you're on holiday? After all, its not like you're using the property, is it? In fact; you're paying for the use of another one

Its.... Just..... Like.....[b] SOOOOOOOOOO[/b] unfair!

We only use them two mornings a week to give my wife a break (have a 5month and 19month old) but did pay £480/month for 4 days

So your wife is not even working but has a rest during the week and you complain at the childminder?
i am struggling to not have a go here and I have been there with a slightly larger age gap but WTF?
family , friends, MumTFU?
Again no offence but this is one of the ultimate first world problems

Why not give up work one day per week yourself - is it not about the same cost?

Sorry otsd not meantot be a troll or offensive

The nursery child minder thing is standard practice FWIW and very annoying when you teach as you essentially pay them to do F all and they take term time only kids as well to supplement
Nothing you can do but change every holiday buit that gets tiresome

😆 @ Junkyard

*was wondering who would bite

£44 for a 10 hour day around here in a nursery. We pay for 51 weeks a year (we have to look after have our own children at Christmas *sigh*).
The obvious advantage being that when the staff take holiday, the nursery can cover it

we pay ours a flat weekly rate of £9 an hour for 12 hours a week. We pay her for holidays, sick days etc but the time that she doesn't work is 'banked' for use in the holidays or babysitting as and when.

she's cool with it, so are we.

If you don't like your current arrangement, then shop around.

What happens if you go on holiday with her?

Get a Swedish Au Pair. Then pretend to live your life in some kind of 70's BBC sitcom world involving hilarious compromising situations involving vicars and escaped rabbits

mental that's what it is. this is exactly the reason Mrscarlos went part time so we could do the childcare between us. We currently earn about 16K a year less than 7 years ago but its worth it to bring our kids up rather than pay someone else to.

Get a Swedish Au Pair. Then pretend to live your life in some kind of 70's BBC sitcom world involving hilarious compromising situations involving vicars and escaped rabbits

If at all possible, there should also be a 'beaver' episode.

holy crap childcare costs is probably the most effective contraception I've come across (...stop s****ing at the back!!...).

holy crap childcare costs is probably the most effective contraception I've come across

and there was me thinking they were totally optional

there should also be a 'beaver' episode

We only use them two mornings a week to give my wife a break (have a 5month and 19month old) but did pay £480/month for 4 days.

This is trolling surely? No one is that weak?

The woman across the road from me, who has two boys aged 5 and 3, pays for her younger son to go to nursery before his 'correct' start date (6 moths early or something). She used to send him to a childminder 3 mornings a week too, just so she could have some time to herself, until the childminder told her thanks but he's too much trouble! Expelled from a childminder, that's some effort.

Wife childminds, has done now for 15 years. No one complains about paying when the child is in School or at holidays. Why? Because they understand that they are taking up a place that would be filled. We have a waiting list that is over a year if people dont like the terms and conditions they can god else where, funny thing is they dont!!

Why have children if you have to pay other people to look after them???

holy crap childcare costs is probably the most effective contraception I've come across

You poor naive fool! By the time you get to the point of paying for childcare, your sex life will be but a dim and distant memory

Why have children if you have to pay other people to look after them???

Woohooooooooo - the space ship has landed from Planet Daily Mail. Took slightly longer than I expected actually

Should i explain slowly that it isn't 1950 any more? I won't use big words or anything. Promise

Why have children if you have to pay other people to look after them???

To earn money so you can feed, clothe and house them.

your sex life will be but a dim and distant memory

Whats a sexlife???

To earn money so you can feed, clothe and house them.

Then don't have children, would you have a pet if you couldn';t afford to look after it?

Whats a sexlife???

It's the scandanavian version of Westlife. Isn't it? :-/

Then don't have children, would you have a pet if you couldn';t afford to look after it?

I can afford to look after my child.

I think Flippinheckler is giving DrWato a run for his money today.

I think Flippinheckler is giving DrWato a run for his money today.

It won't be long before he criticises stay-at-home mums (and it will be mums) for not contributing to the economy...

t won't be long before he criticises stay-at-home mums

Nah Mrs FH stayed at home to look after our children!

Did she get a special badge off Naddine Dorres?

Did she get a special badge off Naddine Dorres?

No just an air of smugness 😉

Yep, it's a pretty hard one to swallow this. Our first CM demanded full wack whilst on holiday too - see my original (now closed) [url= http://singletrackmag.com/forum/topic/childminder-question-ref-holiday-entitlement ]post here.[/url]

She needs (targets) to earn £xx thousands of pounds a year. If you can find a childminder who doesn't charge for holidays, then she's either adding that money to your normal bill, or she's struggling for clients (read not very good).

So you just gotta suck it up!

Whilst I can see how easy it is to agree with your sentiment, what you're actually stating is complete BS. Little monkey is now in the care of an awesome CM (30 years in the game) recommended to us by a friend and everyone who knows her at the local pre-school nursery. She charges half the local going rate, won't accept anything for when she OR we are on hols, and only asks to be paid for the time she does. So if we were to pick monkey up at say 3:00 instead of 5:30, she wouldn't expect us to fork out for the 'un-used' 2.5hrs ... I would still pay the full wack in that instance though because she's great and we're fortunate to have her.

EDIT: Also, there was one occasion where she was rushed to hospital overnight and couldn't take monkey the following day. Her daughters, who are both lovely (and in their 30s) stepped in and looked after him for the duration. They both have kids aged 1-5yrs and they all get on great.

Scamper - Member
Seems cheaper than a nursery, any how.

Think / chose carefully before that becomes your decisive factor. Kids can benefit a lot from social interaction with other kids, and they still need to be taught structure, numbers, alphabet, lifes lessons etc.

Its much easier for a childminder to be irresponsible in that regard / looking after your kid on thier own removing the social gains, than it is for a nursery.

I had to question this when I first heard about it (paying them through Holidays) but it is standard practice and finding good childcare is a nightmare, this issue quickly falls of the agenda.

Lots of recent media coverage suggests that Childminding is barely profitable but I would have thought it is a good gig assuming you are up to the job.

Nah Mrs FH stayed at home to look after our children!

Sponging off hubby and the state...

Oh, I agree Kryton from all the `classes' our 9 month old does already. Although there are also benefits of one-to-one.

Sponging off hubby and the state

Rather pay the Mrs than some stranger to look after my [s]monkeys[/s] Children. How can she sponge off the state every child got Child allowance regardless of income, she also works in a school now to fit around the children.

Are you familiar with this minor little niche ideology that some people have been dabbling with, at all?

[url= http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capitalism ]CAPITALISM?[/url]

Its a totally mad thing about supply and demand governing things. I know. I know. Bonkers, eh? It'll never catch on

CAPITALISM OUTDATED!

This threw a rat amongst the pigeons!

As someone said, kids going to a good childminder is actually a really good part of growing up and learning, we chose ours because of reputation and the fact that they get a lot of creative and learning time, nurseries dont offer that, they pay kids min wage to baby sit and spend all their time chasing the brats so if you have a good one they get less attention.

My original question was regarding pay, and how she could charge for both her and our holidays, ours at full whack and hers at full, nothing more, not trolling (whatever the hell trolling actually is - Im sure the only ones that fully understand what it is are the ones doing it, but hey, separate discussion). Anyhow she has since apologiesed for a mistake and its now half pay when either are on holiday, which is fair!

Bringing up a newborn with a 1 year old isnt easy either, those that were bitching clearly havent done it.

And yes people can earn a decent wage for childcare, 2 people doing it, at home or swanning about all day doing their own thing with kids in tow when they want can have 4-6 kids so £2-3k month, plus extras for school run and after school.

£44 for a 10 hour day around here in a nursery. We pay for 51 weeks a year (we have to look after have our own children at Christmas

I never understood this, well Christmas day OK, but why do nurseries not open Bank Holidays or weekends?

Our Nursery shuts down for two weeks over Christmas. TWO WEEKS.

We still have to pay them the full rate.

Our Nursery shuts down for two weeks over Christmas. TWO WEEKS.

Jeez! That scuppers the Christmas holidays!

The lazy workshy bastards! How dare they?!!! Wanting to spend Christmas with their own children instead of looking after yours, eh? 🙄

Two weeks? I can't afford to take a week off work over Christmas.

They also decided to build an extension (to cram extra new customers in) and said 'due to upgrades we are now raising prices'.

Nice.

Two weeks? I can't afford to take a week off work over Christmas.

Yes you could. You just choose not too. Don't be so melodramatic.

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As someone said, kids going to a good childminder is actually a really good part of growing up and learning, we chose ours because of reputation and the fact that they get a lot of creative and learning time, [u]nurseries dont offer that, they pay kids min wage to baby sit and spend all their time chasing the brats so if you have a good one they get less attention.[/u]

Yep, IMO a good CM will do exactly that. Can't agree with you re nurseries not offering that though - way too much of a generalisation. I'll admit we didn't feel comfortable with the first few we visited so we looked further afield and found an awesome one. Fantastic staff + indoor environment + outdoor environment + excellent food + special activities as well as days/evenings for parents to join in.

Yes you could. You just choose not too. Don't be so melodramatic.

I've got 17days carried over from last year and haven't used any of this years yet. I can't afford to take the time off. My employee is more than happy for me to take the time off but in these times its difficult to do so.

How can anyone in a salaried job with holiday entitlement "not afford" to take time off?

Hora. You're always buying bikes and bits. You've just got a new car. You were posting about organising your Alps trip. That's fine. That's your prerogative, and reflects your priorities

So please spare yourself the embarrassment of doing the woe-is-me routine and pleading poverty. Its demeaning for everyone involved

I've got 17days carried over from last year and haven't used any of this years yet.

So you have the time available to you...

My employee is more than happy for me to take the time off

...and your employer is happy for you to take said time off.

but in these times its difficult to do so.

What, you're so busy in "these times" that you can't take time off? Garbage. You just don't want to take the time off that's all.

Two ways for the same result but will probebly go down the Child Minder route partly for some reasons outlined by Bland, and have some promising recommendations but want to get more feedback on the local nurseries. Use of grandparents, changing my working patterns and we are probebly looking at 2 or 3 days. My Wife cannot cut her hours and does flexible 3x12hr shifts so some of that time may go unused.

Its a dirt-cheap lease car, works tight and Alps was cancelled due to costs. Its staycation this year!

How can she sponge off the state every child got Child allowance regardless of income, she also works in a school now to fit around the children.

So you took child benefit, yet your wife didn't pay any tax. Sounds like a benefits scrounger to me...

It's a serious point: in Norway, they've worked out that state-funded child care brings a net benefit to the economy because the costs of providing it are less than the additional tax accrued from working parents.

bland - sounds like the nurseries near you are s*ite. Or you didn't look hard enough. Why as soon as people become parents do they insist on "knowing" how best to raise a child!!?? Its all guess work and every kid responds differently - make your choices and live with it. Don't criticise options that others choose.

Our Nursery shuts down for two weeks over Christmas. TWO WEEKS.

OP I wouldn't want to piss off the person who looks after my kids. Pay her double, keep her sweet.

OP I wouldn't want to piss off the person who looks after my kids. Pay her double, keep her sweet.

Even if I slapped her around, took all the money out of her purse and paid her nothing I'd expect her human nature/the reason why she went into becoming a Childminder would mean she'd treat the child as one of her own.