How did you cope with daycare fees?

[Nai]

Now someone correct me if I am wrong here but I think that the rebate is going up to 50% soon with the new government. I know that my CC is $210 p/w for 3 days and I get $20 CCB so pay $190 p/w and we got over $2500 back at tax time. We also got back $1200 for family tax rebate.

Obviously this doesn't help while you have to pay it but it helps if you put it away to use throughout the year the following year.

I think there is a proposal to have that rebate done quarterly as opposed to annually to help families out but now sure when that is meant to be coming is or if it has even been passed.

[sushee]

As someone who has only just returned to work after long maternity leave, I have to say taxtime can't come around soon enough. But in the meantime, the $250 we're paying a week for CC at the moment is equivelant to the rent for a small house :P.

[Danielle]

Wow! It sounds so tough, if both my kids are in daycare 5 days a week I would only bring home between 100-200 for a 38 hour week - unless I worked heaps of overtime and daddy looked after them, but then Id get taxed on the extra I worked anyhow... gee they make it hard! And daddy already has to work overtime at the moment just to keep on top of mortgage repayments with interest rises, and we pay $1.50 Ltr for diesel and he travels 500kms a day for work and it comes out of our pocket, my oh my! Now I can see why more and more mums are staying home until their kids are in school, at least school comes cheaper!

[Amity]

I did some sums back when I was with XH. We had two in daycare. Cost was $75 per day (before CCB). XH earned about $45K per annum. I had to earn the equivalent of at least $80K per annum to make it "worthwhile" after losing the FTB Parts A & B, and taking into account travel to and from work.

I earned about $20 per day. However it was best for my career if I went back to work, and also to get away from XH (that's another story)...

So it's hard... but for me it was worthwhile.