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Hi, I'm a Head of Nursery in Surrey, we are linked to an Independent School and numbers are dwindling here, despite our 'Outstanding' Ofsted report, an amazing environment and a 1:5 staff ratio.
Our numbers have been affected by 3 new Children's Centres that are set up within a 5 mile radius.
Yesterday I received the Provider guide for funded nursery places and am deeply concerned how this will further affect our provision.
We are part of the Private system and most of the children will go on into the school as a whole and the school operates for 35 weeks of the year.. you can see where I'm going with this one...
As a school entrant the parents pay a registration fee and a deposit, which is not going to be allowed under the new ruling and when we give the parents back the NEG, it shows as a deduction on the bill. We have now been informed that the EYFE cannot be shown as a deduction on any invoice.
Our session is 3 hours and a child that stays all day is charged £1.50 for a cooked lunch and supervision for the half hour between the morning and afternoon session...
We are struggling as to how to now bill our parents... the deposit and registration is for entry to the school as a whole... does anyone have any comments before I have to discuss the matter with Head and Governors? We are all of the belief that our sector is being 'squeezed out'?

Jo

Hi Jo, I dont know how it works in the independent sector.
Could the school take the registration fee and deposit when the child is ready to start school rather than nursery?
On the invoices can you just charge for what they having rather than show them what they're not being charged for.
I do the invoices for playgroup but the funded children dont get one. Three funded children do an extra session and this is all they have on their invoice.

Do you just allow a few children free entitlement then and how does this work? What is the criteria for that?

I know of one independent school locally which only invoices for the additional costs over and above the free 2.5 hours , clearly stating that 2.5 hours a day are covered by education grant and money due is additional care/costs outside of these hours. they do not charge a registration fee etc, but could this be due on moving to school when no longer funded by grant.

Inge

They start at 2.5 hence the invoices, plus 2 children who are eligible claim funding elsewhere so they are invoiced for the time they spend with us. All eligible others dont reciev an invoice because their fees are covered by the funding. Its a free place.
We do charge a registration fee though, this was set up due to parents changing their mind about comng to us but letting us know so we had spare places, it messed about with our budgets.