Salary sacrifice query

[Rubybaby]

Hoping someone can advise here (I recently posted this thread in the accounts sub forum), as both myself and parents been hitting a brick wall with this!
Parent pays for their child's care through a salary sacrifice scheme and has recently had another baby. As she is now on maternity leave (and pay), she won't require care for the older child from Sept onwards, but intends to place baby with me early in the new year if I have space.

She has been advised that if she stops the payments (for the older child) from the scheme now, she won't be able to resume them to pay for future childcare, and can't 'bank' or accrue them herself until she returns to work.
Meanwhile, these direct salary payments will continue to be credited to my account(and declared on my tax return as income), and I understand that as I'm unable to refund these either to her or her employer ( L.A in this case;mum teaches)until they're needed, would it be possible to use the payments as either a retainer for baby's future place, or towards a deposit , (which I would normally offset against a child's final month's fees to cover a notice period?), or maybe both?
Either way, they would still be used to pay for childcare, but is this ok to do?

Any advice would really be appreciated, thank you, and sorry for the long post x

[Kiddleywinks]

Short and sweet but yes, I believe it can :thumbsup:

[Mouse]

What would happen if she carried on paying you from September until the New Year then didn't bring the baby to you?

Have you spoken to the voucher company yourself? I have looked after the children of a teacher and through the summer holidays (when she didn't pay me) she just banked the money in her account and used it once the children came back.

[moggy]

Is this to do with the current employer voucher scheme (like Sodexo, ComputerShare, Edenred etc) ending and the new tax-free childcare Gov scheme starting?
Has the family checked out childcarechoices.com to see what is actually the best options for their situation?
Banking money that may actually not be used for childcare in the end (who knows what the future holds- the baby might not come to you in the end) sounds wrong, and you'd need to know the process for refunding that to the source (not the parent if it is tax-free) if things do not work out as expected.
I'd speak to the provider of the scheme and get it sorted out with them, it is a very specific situation and without knowing exactly what's in the terms and conditions I don't think we can advise really.

[Rubybaby]

What would happen if she carried on paying you from September until the New Year then didn't bring the baby to you?

Have you spoken to the voucher company yourself? I have looked after the children of a teacher and through the summer holidays (when she didn't pay me) she just banked the money in her account and used it once the children came back.

My thoughts exactly, Mouse, and I don't understand why the payments can't be accrued by the employer/scheme in parents account and then used to pay for the baby's fees either, but mum has previously been told that this isn't an option that is available to her. It's possible that the info she was given before needs updating, but in any case it would make sense to me for any scheme to be able to accommodate parent's holidays/breaks etc when payments for childcare aren't required? I've not yet spoken to them directly, but I expect them to contact me in response to mum's most recent questions about how we can all proceed; thanks, Mouse.

[Rubybaby]

Is this to do with the current employer voucher scheme (like Sodexo, ComputerShare, Edenred etc) ending and the new tax-free childcare Gov scheme starting?
Has the family checked out childcarechoices.com to see what is actually the best options for their situation?
Banking money that may actually not be used for childcare in the end (who knows what the future holds- the baby might not come to you in the end) sounds wrong, and you'd need to know the process for refunding that to the source (not the parent if it is tax-free) if things do not work out as expected.
I'd speak to the provider of the scheme and get it sorted out with them, it is a very specific situation and without knowing exactly what's in the terms and conditions I don't think we can advise really.

Thanks, Moggy,
I wondered about whether this had anything to do with the new govt scheme being introduced too, but apparently not; it seems unrelated, but I'm expecting to be contacted by the provider of the scheme , so I'll hopefully get some answers or a bit of clarity, at least!
It may be that the parent will come out of the current scheme , if we can't find a solution that works for us all; hopefully it won't come to that, but I'll mention childcarechoices to her in any case (thank you!).

[Bluebell]

would Mum be able to amend the monthly amount rather than stop it - so reduce it to £5 a month to continue being in the scheme but not leave completely? - depending if there is a monthly minimum amount. i also work as a teacher but the school used a voucher scheme rather than direct salary sacrifice - i could amend the value by going online and doing it myself and the minimum i could reduce it to was £20 a month. some employees don't allow you to amend directly you have to go through HR but it seems ridiculous that this system wouldn't be flexible for the needs of the parent!

[Rubybaby]

would Mum be able to amend the monthly amount rather than stop it - so reduce it to £5 a month to continue being in the scheme but not leave completely? - depending if there is a monthly minimum amount. i also work as a teacher but the school used a voucher scheme rather than direct salary sacrifice - i could amend the value by going online and doing it myself and the minimum i could reduce it to was £20 a month. some employees don't allow you to amend directly you have to go through HR but it seems ridiculous that this system wouldn't be flexible for the needs of the parent!

I agree, Bluebell, and would think that the system could be a lot more flexible than it appears to be, but so far , amending the amount hasn't been mentioned as an option. There must be a simple solution that as you say, works for the parent! Not heard back from them yet, but will keep you posted, and thank you for your reply x