food expenses help!

[kirstya]

Hi! :)

I am ploughing through my expenses and have decided to claim for food by dividing my weekly spend by total number of family and mindees, then multiplying by number of mindees. I was wondering for those of you who do it this way, what do you do with after schoolers or mindees who only come a few hours per week? Do you still include them in the number you divide by?

E.g. In April I had mindee here 8-3 mon-fri (so not eating tea here) then 4 different after schoolers - 2 here tues pm and the other 2 wed & thu pm (all eating tea). So do I count that as 5 mindees? There are 4 of us in the family so that would mean me claiming over half my food bill as an expense which doesn't seem right!

Hope that's made sense!!!:blush:

[cathtee]

I just do a blanket fee of £1.50 per meal but that also includes all drinks and snacks during the day not sure if that is right either:(

[MrAnchovy]

Three meals a day for four people seven days a week is 84 meals a week, i think you have had mindees for 11 meals a week so you could claim 11/95 of your food bill. You may not find this works out well for you.

[Chatterbox Childcare]

When the HMRC self employed advisor came out to me she said it doesn't matter how many meals so I just use the number of children per week, I include them even if they are only here once. He eats enough for 5 children anyway!

[kirstya]

Thank you for the replies. I have decided to work out an average cost of each meal and snack and claim it that way - seems fairer - and also saved me trawling through all my receipts that have been thrown in a cupboard for the last 15 months!:blush: