Working, nursery crisis ect please help!!

[babyA]

Hey ladies haven't been on in a while am working full time, caring for my babies and sleeping the rest! hope everyone is getting on well and little ones look so cute in pics I'm seeing on here when I get a sec.
I went back to work when izzy was 6months due to money I am the main bread winner my partner reduced his hours to part time and works four days a week opposite to my work pattern so unfortunately no time together with all of us. Two days a week was covered by grandparents . We cannot afford childcare as it is more than what we would earn! we r not entitled to anything other than child benefit! And money situation is now awful! one grandparent can't do one of the days and my partner may be going self employed in couple months where his pay will match mine but it will be 7 days a week to start with so I will need to drop days to look after babies which I can't wait for to spend more time with them. Has anyone had to drop work completely because can't afford childcare? If so what r u then entitled to? Outgoings are high mainly rent n bills as privately renting! any advice would be appreciated as battling with conscience that I'm not home but can't afford to me not work but can't afford childcare feel sooo stuck an low about it all x

 

[cosmicgirl]

It would be worth your while dropping just below the threshold for child tax credits so that they help with the cost of childcare. Look into it hun, I couldn't work if we didn't get help with our childcare payments and we get no help from family x

 

[ZMD]

Id have a, look on entitled to put in just OHs wage or part time hours xx

 

[mum2b410]

Sorry hun, can't offer advice but hope u manage to get things sorted soon, it sounds incredibly stressful! Xx

 

[becciboo26]

I am interested in the answers you will get here cos i will have the same problem, but no family can help

 

[BabysMomma]

I just started new job in May and LO will be starting crèche next month as family can't continue looking after her. It's just been a short term solution until a place opened up for her at crèche. I've did my sums and I'll get £20 a week extra for working...but then that's to go on petrol for running her to crèche and picking her up...I'm actually going to be worse off working but don't know how much exactly until she starts crèche!

I can only give it a chance and see what happens but yeh its getting me down too tbh. I'm in two minds whether to give up work until she's older or just rough it. But I can't even make that decision until I know how much I'll be left with every week/month.

hun and sorry I don't have any advice for you. xx

 

[GregorysGirl]

hun,

I put a thread on the 'money n finance ' section about this....try a website called entitledto.co.uk.
You can put various scenarios in ..... so for eg...if u were thinking of dropping to 16 hours for eg...so u could look after LOs with no childcare, it will tell u exactly how much child tax credits n working tax credits you'd give. So u can se a comparison of different set ups.

I did it and it worked out if I went back to a lesser paid role, which is less stress Id be earning 80quid more than if I went bk to my high stress better paid job. so deffo worth a look.

Another website is www.listentothetaxman.co.uk it tells you what ur wages would be after tax and calculates a mnthly wage once NI etc student loan and pesion if any have been removed.

xx