How to work out food expenses

[flipflop20]

Ok, so I've started looking after my first mindee this week and have been feeding her with lunch, snacks and drinks. How do you put these in the expenses, obviously the food is brought as part of my weekly shop so not all of it is for minding.

I've really got to sort out my expenses

[Elkie Mawdsley]

I usually buy some things specificly for minding (like cereals, yoghurts) as part of the usual shop and just entee the actual cost into expenses. If it is something aplit between family and minded - I will put a portion of the cost into expenses. E.g. - if whike chicken is £6.50 and used to feed 1 mindee and 4 family, I will enter (6.50/4) £1.63 into expenses.

[Happy Bunny]

I have 8 children for meals 2 of my own I buy food for the meals and put it at the front of my shopping then ask for a subtotal, the amount I divide by 8 then times by 6 this is the amount i put through. once a month I also put through washing and dishwasher tablets etc

[MrsP2C]

I worked out actual costings of a few typical meals per child and then took an average and this is the amount I put through expenses. I check once or twice a year as food costs change.

I don't keep receipts for food purposes but do go through them each month as I do a separate entry for nappy sacks & wipes and 50% of cleaning products.

[LizP]

I'm confused, I have been told to save ALL receipts, regardless of the amount. Highlight items for the business and staple the weekly receipts together? Perhaps this is more than some people are doing?

[natlou82]

I split the shopping where possible so a whole receipt is CM food shopping eg:- 6 yoghurts in cm trolley 4 yoghurts in home trolley etc. Anything that can't be split eg meat it put on home receipt highlight and divide into how many eating. As far as I'm aware you should keep all food receipts no matter how small for the food standards agency in case of food poisoning, you need to be able to show when and where the food came from.

[VeggieSausage]

I put through £2 per meal per child that I have, so I go through my register each week and add up how many meal I have done, the same for snacks etc.....a lot of childminders seem to base their costs on the school dinner cost that their local school charges.

You have to keep all food receipts in case there was ever any complaint about food you had given children or a child became ill. But you must keep all food receipts regardless of what you put through on your tax.

[mama2three]

it gets confusing doesn't it? And there are a few ways of doing it which whilst allowing you to use the best method for you can also cause extra confusion.

Every so often I work out exactly what each meal / snack has cost for mindees over a week. This is the figure I then use for meal costs in my expenses - and I can show HMRC how I came to that figure should I need to. I keep the receipts for the 'working out week' in with my expenses but not other general food receipts unless there are other things on them I wish to claim.
However I also keep every receipt with food on it for a period of 3 months , this is nothing to do with expenses , it is an environmental health requirement , I keep them in an envelope in the back of my safer food better business file.

[Vikki5531]

it gets confusing doesn't it? And there are a few ways of doing it which whilst allowing you to use the best method for you can also cause extra confusion. Every so often I work out exactly what each meal / snack has cost for mindees over a week. This is the figure I then use for meal costs in my expenses - and I can show HMRC how I came to that figure should I need to. I keep the receipts for the 'working out week' in with my expenses but not other general food receipts unless there are other things on them I wish to claim. However I also keep every receipt with food on it for a period of 3 months , this is nothing to do with expenses , it is an environmental health requirement , I keep them in an envelope in the back of my safer food better business file.

I like the idea of keeping food receipts with the Safer Food Better Business file - I might start doing this myself, thanks :)

[Chatterbox Childcare]

I have 8 children for meals 2 of my own I buy food for the meals and put it at the front of my shopping then ask for a subtotal, the amount I divide by 8 then times by 6 this is the amount i put through. once a month I also put through washing and dishwasher tablets etc

You would have to include the adults if you are using your receipts

[Chatterbox Childcare]

There are various ways and you just need to work out what is right and probably quickest for you.

1. Do a separate shop for business and personal

2. Take your receipts and work out a "cost per meal" - need to do this reguarly as food prices do creep up on us

3. Take your receipts - take off 100% business and put this through, take off 100 personal and disregard this and divide the balance by the total number of people in your house and mindees. This gives you a per head figure, multiply this by the number of mindees. This way is accurate to when you purchased the goods and can include, dishwasher tablets, washing powder aswell as food.

Whichever way you go you don't have to do it weekly if the number of mindees are the same. You could add them all up and do it at the end of the month, quartlery, 6 months or yearly if you want to.