"free" preschool year

misc2013

Feeling more than a bit stupid here. I thought with ECCE you got 3 hours free/ day. My lad is in preschool 3 times/ week and the session is 4 hrs so I presumed ok, we pay the difference and that's fine. But the subsidy only covers half the fees! A preschool/ 4 hour session is 26 per day and the total subsidy is only 64/64 euro per week?? Is our playschool remarkably expensive?? i went with a provider used by friends so word of mouth etc and it is a full time facilityso the flexblility of being able to get a longer day/ extra day if needed was a big plus but it appears the ECCE in my case is 50% subsidy, not "free" at all.

happywithlife

I use a community creche so set up can be somewhat different to private sector but in our's any extra care is broken up into "sessions" of 3 hrs 5 hrs and full day. You pay for the "session" regardless of how much you use so 1 extra hr a day would be sane cost to me as 3 hrs

I would imagine something similar us happening to you.

If you only used the 3 hrs of ECCE then you wouldn't pay anything so yes thst would be free. Note though the subsidy comes nowhere near covering the cost of running the service from the providers point of view

pwurple

Yup, the ECCE is not free.  
If someone could provide a building, trained staff etc for a small portion of the year, 3 hours a day, then it may be. But no business can survive doing that , so they set minimums. 
To be honest, I'm ok with them having to do that, they need to make a living too. 
I'm not OK with this ECCE scheme being lauded as an achievement, when it makes very little difference. 

Our minimum payment on top of ECCE isn't too bad in the wider scheme of things. We pay €157 euro monthly. We get 4 hours per day, during term. (so one extra hour a day).

dori_dormer

Its 245 euro a month Sept - June. If your child is in during term time and summer, you'll be paying more. Also if they provide food.
Its very little money and really the care givers deserve more

lazygal

The scheme is for 15 hours. Why is your child only getting 12 hours?

misc2013

lazygal wrote: »

The scheme is for 15 hours. Why is your child only getting 12 hours?

I chose to send him 3 days/week for the first year to increase to 5 days from next Sept. Given that since Jan it's cost me E148/month after ECCE for the 26 weeks, it was enough. For 5 days, it will be E272 approx per month after ECCE. Plus childminder for 2. Yikes! :eek:

misc2013

pwurple wrote: »

Yup, the ECCE is not free.

I'm not OK with this ECCE scheme being lauded as an achievement, when it makes very little difference.

.

It's mad. I googled it again after posting and every search practically describes it as a "free preschool year" or that you get 3 free hours/ day. Call it what it is - subsidised preschool year.

shesty

That sounds very strange....we actually get four hours four days a week with an extra monthly cost of 70eur.

misc2013

shesty wrote: »

That sounds very strange....we actually get four hours four days a week with an extra monthly cost of 70eur.

That's very good. Is that a community creche/ playschool or private facility?

angeldelight

misc2013 wrote: »

It's mad. I googled it again after posting and every search practically describes it as a "free preschool year" or that you get 3 free hours/ day. Call it what it is - subsidised preschool year.

Well you do if you don’t need any additional care - you can send them for the 3 hours a day five days a week during term time and not pay anything

sillysocks

Maybe it’d be worth contacting your local Childcare Committee and asking. I think every county has one, and I’ve found ours very helpful.

For what it’s worth we have one child on 4 hours a day Ecce, and we just pay 6 eur extra per day for the extra hour. So 30 eur a week extra (and that’s optional, some kids leave after 3 hours and pay nothing).

Anne_cordelia

It is free. We send our little one for 3 hours 5 days a week and pay nothing. So it is a free preschool year!

shesty

misc2013 wrote: »

That's very good. Is that a community creche/ playschool or private facility?

A private facility.Their preschool hours are in the morning and they do after school care, which is separate and you pay separately.
All the playschools I know of operate like that-around us anyway....I am having trouble understanding what's going on with yours??He should get 15 hours a week.....

lazygal

No extra fees here either. All children go for three hours five days a week. Other services are charged for separately. Our minder collects so we don't use the afternoon hours.

shesty

Exactly.We get 16 hours hence the extra charge per month.But it just happens that those are their preschool hours, they don't have any others

Digs

Yes this thread had me totally confused! My daughter had 3 hours a day 5 days a week totally free which is the hours of the scheme. We had a very flexible service in which if we needed them to keep her an extra hour or two at short notice they would no problem and we paid €5 an hour outside of the ECCE scheme.

lazygal

I know of a local creche who, AFAICS, spreads the cost over the whole year but its for parents who use the full day service so they're paying the same for hours over school holidays as they do for term time hours. But I've never heard of people paying so much on top of their ECCE scheme for core 'free' hours as in the OP. Seems like something is wrong somewhere.

misc2013

angeldelight wrote: »

Well you do if you don’t need any additional care - you can send them for the 3 hours a day five days a week during term time and not pay anything

No. I pay E26/session. The ECCE covers E12 ish of that.

misc2013

sillysocks wrote: »

Maybe it’d be worth contacting your local Childcare Committee and asking. I think every county has one, and I’ve found ours very helpful.

For what it’s worth we have one child on 4 hours a day Ecce, and we just pay 6 eur extra per day for the extra hour. So 30 eur a week extra (and that’s optional, some kids leave after 3 hours and pay nothing).

This is what I understood happened.

As i asked before, is my childcare centre particularly expensive? It is E26 for a session of 4 hrs. He goes 3 days a week. so gets 3/5 of the weekly subsidy of ~64E/ week. It only covers half the fee. I didn't consider the cost before ECCE as I just thought he would get the first 3 hours free regardless.

lazygal

Our service just does the full 15 hours over five days. And the additional services are charged totally separately. I don't know anywhere who does three days and charges extra on top for the ECCE.

misc2013

might be worth a call to local childcare centre/ office,

happywithlife

misc2013 wrote: »

This is what I understood happened.

As i asked before, is my childcare centre particularly expensive? It is E26 for a session of 4 hrs. He goes 3 days a week. so gets 3/5 of the weekly subsidy of ~64E/ week. It only covers half the fee. I didn't consider the cost before ECCE as I just thought he would get the first 3 hours free regardless.

If he's holding up a full time placement by attending 3 days a week for 4 hours they may be charging you per session for that extra hour to try & recover costs. Did you ask for thst extra hour? Can you reduce it if it's proving costly? The €26 per session would be in line with my community creche at least

misc2013

happywithlife wrote: »

If he's holding up a full time placement by attending 3 days a week for 4 hours they may be charging you per session for that extra hour to try & recover costs. Did you ask for thst extra hour? Can you reduce it if it's proving costly? The €26 per session would be in line with my community creche at least

Good question. They divide their sessions into 2*4hrs. I would get charged for 4 as for 1 hr only I thought the 3 hrs were covered when I signed up for ECCE. How much do other preschools charge per 3-4 hrs?

shesty

But to my understanding they ARE covered.Everyone I know is getting three free hours a day, whether they take them all is another thing.But there's no weekly charge anything like what you are describing.

I'm beginning to feel very stupid here myself, at understanding this thread!!Either that or you are being very ripped off OP.......

lazygal

shesty wrote: »

But to my understanding they ARE covered.Everyone I know is getting three free hours a day, whether they take them all is another thing.But there's no weekly charge anything like what you are describing.

I'm beginning to feel very stupid here myself, at understanding this thread!!Either that or you are being very ripped off OP.......

It seems like its nearly designed to be confusing....

mirrorwall14

We're in montessori. Totally free for 15 hours a week. They have after preschool options and school options but we aren't availing so its totally free

Flippyfloppy

I'm totally confused. But I'll have a stab nonetheless.

€65 a week is what is paid by the ECCE to the playschools. So that's moreorless the nationwide rate.

As far as I knew, I may be wrong, you have to do the full five days to avail of the scheme? Maybe that's where it's going wrong, are you sure you're signed up to the scheme?

Additionally, why is the session 4 hours long? Are you using an extra hour on top of the usual three hours that playschool usually is, or have the playschool set it to 4 hours?

Also, 26x3 = 78, so if you are actually signed up to the scheme, and somehow using 12 hours over non standard days, which I'm not sure you're allowed, then you should be paying 12/13 extra?

Or do you mean, theoretically over a 5 day week, it would be 130? If so, the extra hour must be charged at a premium of €13, so you must ask yourself, is it worth it? Are meals provided?

I recommend phoning your local childcare Commitee. I cannot stress just how helpful they are!

sillysocks

"Flippyfloppy;107302598&#8221 wrote:

As far as I knew, I may be wrong, you have to do the full five days to avail of the scheme? Maybe that's where it's going wrong, are you sure you're signed up to the scheme?

You definitely can do less than 5 days, however if you do you get the allowance pro rata. So still just 3 hours per day for the days you do it-not the full 15 hours split over 2/3 days if that makes sense.

So with a 3 day week you’d just get 9 hours allowance, not 15.

Flippyfloppy

sillysocks wrote: »

You definitely can do less than 5 days, however if you do you get the allowance pro rata. So still just 3 hours per day for the days you do it-not the full 15 hours split over 2/3 days if that makes sense.

So with a 3 day week you’d just get 9 hours allowance, not 15.

Thanks that's interesting, I thought at one point it wasn't possible!

happywithlife

misc2013 wrote: »

Good question. They divide their sessions into 2*4hrs. I would get charged for 4 as for 1 hr only I thought the 3 hrs were covered when I signed up for ECCE. How much do other preschools charge per 3-4 hrs?

I think they operate same as mine and it's not that difficult really to my understanding (IF I'm right in the following)

2*4 in your post means they divide their day into 2 blocks of 4 hours
You get charged for a block of 4 hours
3 of those hours are ECCE
Assuming you choose to place child for an.additional hour (previously asked but not clarified)
You pay the sessions rate even though your child is only using 1 hour of it. Assuming your creche has a "or part there of" wording I their fee policy I don't see the problem. You are using part of their session and hence charged for that session.
If you choose to collect your child after the 3 hours of ECCE you wouldn't have to pay anything.
The only way I'd have a problem is if the creche insist on you using that hour and forcing you to pay the session rate. Extra charges like they hate against the rules as I understand them

Eta charges per session only kick in after ECCE class has ended. It's easier to.understand if you think of using the hour of the session a bit like after school club. The ECCE class is run separately to the private/extra childcare aspect of the creche as such. (Even if they are in the same room)

shesty

Well I do get that because that's essentially what our place does, but if that's the case, the OP's place seems to be quite pricey.