For children, the six-week or longer school summer holiday is a joy. But for parents, the lengthy stretch of time out of school has its practical and financial challenges.
Holiday trips during the peak summer months are likely to run into the thousands of pounds while a place at a holiday club costs an average of £157 a week, according to the latest Holiday Childcare Survey by the children’s charity Coram. Then there’s the extra cost of food to consider as well as any extra childcare you’ll need.
It’s perhaps little surprise that parents may spend an average of £1,047 a week during school holidays, according to insurance provider Reassured, which polled 1,000 parents about their summer holiday spend.
To help you bring down the cost, we’ve put together some top tips on how families can cut down over the summer holidays.
Get money off clubs through tax-free childcare
Tax-free childcare is available to most working parents in the UK, giving you up to £2,000 a year or £500 every three months towards childcare costs. More than one million families are eligible for the scheme, but it’s estimated hundreds of thousands aren’t claiming even though they could benefit.
Tax-free childcare can be used for children up to the age of 11, or 17 if they have a disability, and can be put towards accredited holiday clubs, childminders or sports activities. Not all providers offer tax-free childcare, but it’s worth checking whether you can pay through your tax-free childcare account before booking a place.
Tax-free childcare is available to working parents, including self-employed workers, who earn less than £100,000 a year.
You may also be getting childcare vouchers, if you joined the childcare voucher scheme before October 2018. These allow you to “sacrifice” some of your pay from an employer to fund registered childcare, saving on tax and national insurance. Many club providers will accept childcare vouchers.
Vouchers are no longer available to new applicants, as the scheme has been replaced by tax-free childcare.
If you’re on universal credit, you could get up to 85 per cent of your childcare costs covered up to £1,014.63 a month for one child, or £1,739.37 if you have multiple children. Use a benefits calculator such as the one offered by the charity Turn2Us to check your benefit entitlement.
Meanwhile, if your child gets benefits-related free school meals, you should be entitled to the government’s holiday activities and food (HAF) programme, which provides free activity clubs over the holidays.
Check out charity offerings
There are charities that help households on a low income with the cost of a holiday. These include the Family Holiday charity, which helps families with a household income of less than £24,000 who have not had a family holiday for the past four years.
Other charities that can offer financial assistance towards a holiday include the Mary Macarthur Holiday Trust, which provides up to £350 to women “in need of a break”, and Go Beyond, which offers breaks to people aged 8 to 13.
Turn2Us has a list of other charities that can also help with holidays or activities.
Use your local library
The Summer Reading Challenge, aimed at children aged four to 11, takes place at libraries throughout the UK each year.
Children are encouraged to read books and collect stickers and other rewards along the way. There is a different theme every year and this year’s theme is “Marvellous makers”, which focuses on creativity.
The challenge is completely free and is estimated to reach more than 700,000 children across the UK each year.
Be organised and work out a budget
Stacey McNabney, who has two children aged 10 and 15, says the challenge is finding enough to keep them amused over the seven-week summer holiday without spending a fortune.
Stacey, a social media coach based in Stirling, Scotland, sets money aside throughout the year to pay for holiday activities. She saves through a “spare change” round-up feature offered by her bank and by putting spare coins into a piggy bank.
At the start of the holidays, she gets her children to write a list of places they like to visit. They’ll then categorise them by what’s indoors or outdoors (in case of rain), and what’s free or the cost of each place. Stacey will then create a plan of what they’ll visit during the summer break.
An activity-based day out for her family of four can cost around £100, so Stacey says these are limited to no more than one a week or one a fortnight.
“It’s worth remembering what you’ve got on your doorstep, and that children have got big imaginations. You don’t always need to be spending money, it’s about being creative in the time you have with them. My children are quite happy to collect rocks at the local water fountains or to play in the park,” she adds.
Stacey works from home, which means she can be flexible around the children’s plans and she no longer needs formal childcare as her children are older. She uses Wowcher to find vouchers for local activities and also signs up to loyalty schemes for places they visit often to get discounts.
“When I was employed I used to dread the summer holidays, because it was a huge financial stress. It’s easier now I’m self-employed and no longer go into an office. I’m also very good at sticking to a budget and being creative. You can still have fun without spending a fortune,” she adds.
Discounted attractions and days out
You can save money on theme parks, major attractions and cinema tickets through supermarket loyalty schemes such as Tesco Clubcard.
Simply convert your points into vouchers and you’ll also get double the value of the points. This means if you convert £10 worth of points, this will double to £20 worth of vouchers. These vouchers can be used towards theme parks and attractions such as Legoland, Thorpe Park and Cadbury World, as well as cinema tickets at Cineworld.
Another option could be the Merlin Annual Pass. This will give you unlimited access to some of the UK’s top attractions for free all-year round, including places such as Legoland, Sea Life centres and The Dungeons.
To use the pass during the summer holidays, you’ll need the Gold Pass that costs £239 per person a year. The cheapest Discovery pass is £99 a year but this is off-peak only and can’t be used from the end of July to the end of August.
To get to attractions, bear in mind that many train operators offer ‘Kids for a Quid’ train tickets, where children aged 5 to 15 can travel for just £1 or £2 when travelling with an adult during off-peak times.
Children up to the age of 10 also get free unlimited travel on London’s buses and tubes.
Rent expensive items
If you are travelling with very young children, you’ll likely need extensive amounts of kit. Through companies such as Tiny Explorers, you can rent baby equipment such as lightweight strollers, car seats and travel cots. For example, you can rent the Babyzen Yoyo stroller for £40 a week. The cost of buying new would be around £320.
If you are based in London, Library of Things offers the chance to rent items such as projectors or popcorn machines to host your own cinema night.
Use “kids eat free” offers
Many restaurants and cafes run “kids eat free” offers during the holidays, although typically it’s when you buy an adult meal.
Morrisons supermarket allows children to eat free any time of year with every adult meal over £4.49. At Sainsbury’s Cafes, you can get a hot meal for a child for £1 with every adult main over £5.20.
Asda offers a deal where children can eat for £1 in its cafes with no adult spend required. This doesn’t just run in the holidays – it’s available all day every day throughout 2024.
Other restaurant chains including Bill’s, TGI Fridays and Bella Italia also offer holiday deals where children can eat for free when you order an adult meal.
Use cashback websites
Cashback sites can be a useful way to save money by getting cashback on purchases you would have done anyway. The two biggest cashback websites in the UK are Topcashback and Quidco.
Topcashback.co.uk is currently offering 10 per cent cashback on hotel bookings through Tui and 6 per cent cashback for ferry bookings to France and Ireland through P&O Ferries. You can also earn cashback on National Trust membership, groceries, fashion and other online shopping.
On Quidco, you can currently earn 4 per cent cashback through Travelodge or 6 per cent cashback at Argos.
Buddy up or ask grandparents
If your child is in school and you are part of a parent’s WhatsApp for your child’s class, it’s worth setting up a spreadsheet to align plans.
This could mean you arrange for your child to be at a specific club at the same time as other children in their class, or you could highlight on the spreadsheet when you are free for a play date or to offer a childcare swap.
Grandparents often help out too over the school holidays, although it’s easier if they live close by.
Time your holidays well
Prices are at their peak during the school summer holiday. The last two weeks of the summer break tend to be the cheapest time to go away, says Topcashback, as most families won’t want to wait until the end of August or early September to go away.
Its research found a week-long trip for four at a three-star resort in Majorca flying from Manchester Airport on Wednesday 24 July for £2,862. However, the same trip will cost £411 less if you were to go on Wednesday 28 August.
You could also take the risk on a last-minute holiday to get a cheaper deal on an all-inclusive or package holiday. Check websites such as lastminute.com, loveholidays.com or Jet2 for last-minute deals.
Another option is to use Skyscanner’s “explore everywhere” option to see cheap flights for a range of destinations.
Go all inclusive
You may save money by opting for “all-inclusive” holidays, where drinks, meals or snacks are included with the price.
It means all food and drink costs are covered, and flights, transfers to and from the airport, kids clubs and entertainment may also be included in addition to accommodation. The total cost of your holiday is practically covered so you won’t have to worry about budgeting as you go along.
Research by the consumer group Which? found that for six European destinations, opting for an all-inclusive package holiday in a three-star hotel was cheaper than a do-it-yourself holiday in five out of the six. This was for a family of four booking in August 2023.
The cheapest destination for an all-inclusive package holiday is Spain’s Costa Barcelona or Benidorm in Costa Brava, says Which?.
Enter competitions
A great way to get products or experiences for free is to enter competitions. The Rosemary and Porkbelly website has a list of upcoming competitions for UK and worldwide holidays.
You can also win cash prizes, days out, products and vouchers by entering competitions. For example, through the Coca-Cola app there are thousands of instant prizes currently available to celebrate UEFA Euro 2024.
Check out the Super Lucky website or Facebook page for more competition details and ideas.
Go geocaching or treasure hunting
If you think you’ve exhausted all the local parks, activities like geocaching can add a new dimension of fun completely free.
Here, you use your smartphone or GPS device to discover hidden items in your local neighbourhood. Parents can download an app or sign up to a website that lists geocache locations around the UK, such as geocaching.com/play and opencache.uk. When you’ve selected a geocache, you’ll be given co-ordinates to find the item.