Fees Facts - Children who are at least 3 years old
When does your child qualify for their free early education place?
Please note although the actual term dates vary from year to year to accommodate national holidays e.g., Easter, which moves each year, term dates to determine eligibility remain constant.
| A child born between | |
|---|---|
| 1st April - 31st August (inclusive) | The start of the autumn term following their 3rd birthday |
| 1st September - 31st December (inclusive) | The start of the spring term following their 3rd birthday |
| 1st January - 31st March (inclusive) | The start of the summer term following their 3rd birthday |
Entitlement - 15 or 30 hours
All three-year-olds are entitled to 15 hours of free childcare from the term after their third birthday. The new entitlement allows parents to claim an additional 15 hours if they each have individual earnings of approximately £143+ a week.
This means 30 hours per week during term time (only for 38 weeks out of our 39 weeks) or up to 1,140 hours per year. If you aren’t entitled you will carry on receiving the free 15 hours of childcare which is available for all families in England.
Eligibility 30 hours
- A parent* or both parents are working the equivalent of 16 hours per week at least at the national minimum wage i.e. £143+.
- A parent or parents earn less than £100,000 per year each, for dual parent households
- The entitlement extends to those who are self-employed.
- One or both parents are temporarily away from work on maternity, paternity, parental or adoption leave.
- One or both parents are temporarily away from work and in receipt of Statutory Sick Pay.
- One parent is in receipt of benefits relating to caring responsibilities or their own disability.
- One parent is employed, and one parent is disabled or is incapacitated and receiving specific benefits.
*Parent means a person with parental responsibility for the child or care of the child in cases where the parent has remarried or is living with a partner, the step-parent or partner must also meet the earnings threshold.
Using Free Funding across 2 provides
Please let us know if you are using any of your free hours with another provider as this may affect your chargeable fees. Please be aware that if, say, you are using 10 hours per week at a nursery that is ‘stretching’ your entitlement over 51 weeks then you will not have 20 hours left to use with us.
The key figure is 1140 per year so if you have used 10 per week over 51 weeks elsewhere then you only have 1140 - 510 = 630 to use with us. Over 38/39 weeks this only equates to around 16 per week to use with us.
Application process - 30 hours and Tax Free Childcare
Fees Payable on top of free funding
No matter how many free hours your 3-year-old Is entitled to there are still some fees payable:
- Registration Fee £60 - one off fee payable when child joins us. This covers staff time for your Home Visit before joining us, a bookbag, a purple legionnaire sun hat and sun care for the duration of your child’s time with us (meaning you don’t have to worry about sun cream)
- Morning Session £4.50 - includes breakfast/morning snack and lunch
- Afternoon Session £1.50 - includes afternoon snack
- PE - optional PE sessions. These are sessions run by an external coach on two mornings a week. The cost is £6 per month per session and is completely optional. If you would like your child to take part let us know and we will invoice you once they have started. If you would like a free taster session to see if they like the session before committing to the payment then please let us know.
- Extra hours above your free hours - if you want more than your free hours then any extra sessions will be chargeable at the full session price of £26.50 or £23.50 depending on the extra session
- Tax Free Childcare may be available to you which saves you 20% on all of the above fees. Look at the following link to see if you are eligible - https://www.gov.uk/tax-free-childcare
- Tax free childcare can be used alongside 30 hours free childcare
Any queries please email lapalgrangeoffice@yahoo.com
Sessional care hours during term time:
We are extremely flexible to meet you and your child’s need.
If you require childcare in Halesowen, give us a call today on 0121 421 2265 and speak to Stella Lowe or any of the team for further details.
