FAQ
Please see below a list of questions that we are frequently asked. If you require any further information, please don’t hesitate to ask us.
Starting Nursery & Daily Life
- Drop off time is from 7.30. If you arrive before 7.30 you will be asked to wait with your child until 7.30.
- The afternoon drop off time is 1pm. You will be asked to wait if you arrive beforehand.
- Please note that for safety purposes, the school gates are locked from around 8:30am until 4pm approximately. If they are locked, please press the buzzer situated on the right hand side of the electric gates and state that you are a nursery parent.
- For your convenience it is better to drop off well before or well after the school run (8.45 and 3.15) if at all possible, as the area can be quite congested.
- Please drive slowly and carefully in the car park as there are often school children around.
Collection is by 6pm.
Please be aware that a full handover takes 5–10 minutes. If you wish to have a full handover, please factor this into your arrival time for collection. If you arrive after 5:50pm, the contents of the handover will be published to Famly only and a full verbal handover will not be provided.
- If you want to permanently swap your child’s days, we need 1 month’s notice in writing. The possibility to swap will depend on availability.
- If you want to swap on an ad-hoc basis, for example if you have an appointment on a Monday and want to swap your day to Friday, we cannot accommodate these changes for staffing reasons.
Yes. Send an email to the relevant site and we can book in additional extra days depending on availability. Certain days are very busy and we may not be able to accommodate your request.
Yes. We offer a 1-hour free settling-in session once registration has been completed and the deposit has been paid. Any further sessions are at full price, but you can have as many as you like before the official start date of your child.
If you are running late to drop off, please just turn up whenever you can — do not worry about being late. If you are going to be significantly late, around an hour or so later than usual, please send us a text or call so that we do not worry that you have encountered problems en route to the nursery.
If you are running late to collect, we charge £20 per 10 minutes that you are late. This is charged in blocks of 10 minutes. So a 10-minute late collection is £20, while a 12-minute or 20-minute late collection is £40. This fee applies to any late collection after your scheduled session end time.
No. However, we do have some uniform items available to purchase should you wish. We have t-shirts and fleeces, all produced and embroidered locally.
Please ask our management team for a uniform order form if you are interested.
Uniform items are made to order, so we do not keep stock on site and orders can take a couple of weeks to arrive.
Food, Care & What to Bring
- Wellies and a waterproof coat and trousers.
- Depending on the season, a hat, gloves and waterproof coat or sunhat.
- A minimum of one full change of clothes in case your child gets wet or dirty.
- If your child really needs a comforter such as a soft toy, they can bring it, but we take no responsibility if it is lost or broken. We advise stopping bringing a comforter in their final year before school to aid with transition.
- Please ensure all items are fully labelled with your child’s name.
- We do go out in the mud and use paint and messy materials, so we advise you to send children in old clothes. We want children to have fun, get stuck in and not have to worry about what they look like.
No problem.
- Breast milk should be sent in frozen, labelled bags.
- Formula milk should be sent in a sealed container labelled with your child’s name.
No. Please don’t send in any food or drink. We provide all meals as part of our package.
Our food is healthy and homemade and our menu contains no added salt or sugar. We do not serve desserts or sugary or fatty foods unless it is a special occasion such as a birthday or celebration.
We will encourage children to try the food with their friends.
We will not immediately offer an alternative, as this can become disruptive for the other children, but we will not let a child go hungry. We encourage children to try elements of the meal even if they do not want to eat all of it, take into account what else they have eaten that day, and avoid putting pressure on them to eat.
Our meals are ‘self-service’, so children can help themselves to the quantity of food they want and come back for seconds if they wish. Staff monitor this to help children develop healthy portion awareness.
We often find that even fussy children become more willing to try food when they are sitting and eating together with their friends.
Yes. Please provide medical evidence and information about your child’s allergy and we are able to cater for their needs.
- We administer prescription medication in accordance with our medication policy.
- We will apply nappy cream without a prescription and also Calpol in the event of an emergency to bring down a temperature.
- If we give a dose of Calpol, you must collect your child within an hour.
- Please bring a labelled bottle of Calpol if you wish us to administer it to your child.
Brushing teeth is part of our daily routine and toothbrushes and toothpaste are provided by us.
If you wish your child to have a particular kind of toothpaste, you will need to provide your own.
Funding, Fees & Payments
Yes. We stretch our funding across the 51 weeks that we are open. This means that if you are eligible for 15 hours, you will receive 11 hours per week, all year round, with no change during school holidays.
If you are eligible for 30 hours, you will receive 22 hours per week all year round if you are eligible from September.
If you are eligible from January, you will receive 10 hours per week if eligible for 15 hours and 20 hours if eligible for 30 hours.
If you are eligible from April, you will receive 8.5 hours per week if eligible for 15 hours and 17 hours if eligible for 30 hours.
We charge a weekly meal charge and a weekly additional services charge. Our current prices are available under the Fees & Funding section.
Yes. You need to set this up yourself and let us know when you have your code, as we need this to identify the payments when they reach our bank account.
Please note that after processing Tax-Free Childcare at your end, there are usually several days before the money reaches our account. Our usual late payment fees apply if the money does not reach us by the last day of the month.
Yes. We are signed up and registered with most voucher companies.
If you use a new voucher company, please speak to management and they can subscribe us onto the new system.
Unfortunately not. Our staffing and overhead costs remain the same, and in order to keep your child’s space, any days you choose not to attend nursery are still payable in full. We do not issue refunds for days not attended.
The only time of year that we do not charge is when we close over the Christmas period, which is usually for a week. Please see your Terms & Conditions document for further information.
Please call, email us or update the Family app if your child is off sick or on holiday so we can make a note of this and do not call you with safeguarding concerns.
Invoices are sent by the 10th of the month and need to be paid by the 28th of the month.
Payments are made in advance, so for the month of May, for example, payment needs to be received in full by the end of April.
If you want to pay in instalments to manage your budget more easily, such as sending £100 a week, we can accommodate this, but the full balance must be cleared by the 28th of the month.
Our late payment fee is £10 per day accumulative, regardless of the amount owed.
We will not admit your child into nursery unless any outstanding balance is paid in full, as our payment policy is that payment is made in advance of childcare being received.
Communication & Working Together
Yes. Your child will be assigned a key worker before they start.
If you are unhappy with your key worker, please speak to management and changes can be put into place.
You will meet your child’s key worker on your home visit.
Yes. Daily update photos will be uploaded to Family and you will also receive more photos from their week at nursery.
When you first join the nursery, you will be emailed a login directly from Family and can set your own password.
Through Family, you can see observations about your child and information about their food, drink, sleep and toileting. Parents are also encouraged to upload their own photos and stories to share learning from home.
Every 6 weeks, you will receive a more detailed written observation about your child’s progress and current next steps.
Every 6 months, you will receive a progress update for your child.
We upload information about your child’s food, drink, sleep and toileting onto their daily diary on Family.
We hold parents’ evenings twice a year. This is an opportunity to sit down with your child’s key worker and discuss their development and any concerns you may have.
We also have an open-door policy. If you would like a meeting with the nursery manager, your child’s key worker or our SENDCO at any time, please let us know. You do not need to wait for parents’ evening.