How do I get nursery fees paid through my employer?

Your employer needs to offer the workplace nursery benefit (Section 318 ITEPA 2003), which lets you pay nursery fees from pre-tax salary. If they don’t offer it yet, ask your HR, reward or finance team to set it up — it’s designed to be cost-neutral for the employer and can even reduce their National Insurance.

How can I find UK employers that offer workplace nursery benefits?

There’s no public list, and many employers offer it quietly under a benefits-platform name. The best approach is to check your own staff benefits portal, intranet or onboarding documents, and ask HR directly. If your employer doesn’t offer it, you can ask them to — most simply haven’t set it up yet.

Which UK companies offer nursery benefits?

Workplace nursery benefits aren’t limited to a fixed list of companies — any UK employer can offer the Section 318 benefit. Rather than searching for companies that already have it, the more reliable route is to ask your current employer to set it up, since it’s low-effort and cost-neutral for them to run.

Can I sign up for the workplace nursery benefit myself?

No — it runs through payroll, so only your employer can switch it on. Unlike Tax-Free Childcare (which you set up directly with the government), the workplace nursery benefit has to be offered by your employer. The way to get it is to ask them to set it up.

What do I say to my HR team to ask for it?

Keep it short and lead with the reassuring bit: it’s designed to be cost-neutral for the employer and can reduce their National Insurance, while saving parents the tax and NI on their nursery fees. Point them to the employer resources at halobenefits.co.uk/for-employers and offer to help. There’s a copy-paste message in this article you can send as-is.

Is the workplace nursery benefit better than Tax-Free Childcare?

It depends on your circumstances. The workplace nursery benefit has no government cap and saves you Income Tax and National Insurance on your fees, which often beats Tax-Free Childcare’s £2,000-per-child-per-year limit — especially for higher fees, multiple children or higher earners. You generally can’t use both for the same child, so it’s worth comparing which leaves you better off.

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For Parents3 June 20267 min read

How to Ask Your Employer for the Workplace Nursery Benefit

Halo Team

In short: The workplace nursery benefit lets you pay your nursery fees from your pre-tax salary, so you save the Income Tax and National Insurance on those fees — often a meaningful chunk each month. But it has to be set up by your employer. The good news: it’s designed to be cost-neutral for them, and they can even save on employer NI. This guide shows you exactly who to ask and what to say, with a message you can copy and paste to your HR team.

So you’ve heard you can save on nursery fees through your workplace — but when you checked, your employer doesn’t offer it yet. Frustrating, but completely fixable. The workplace nursery benefit (under Section 318 ITEPA 2003) is something thousands of UK employers can offer, and most simply haven’t got round to it. A short, well-aimed nudge from you is often all it takes.

This article walks you through what the benefit is, what it could save you, why it has to come from your employer, and — the important bit — how to raise it in a way that makes saying yes easy.

What the workplace nursery benefit is

Under the workplace nursery benefit, your nursery fees are paid from your pre-tax salary. That means you don’t pay Income Tax or National Insurance on the portion of your salary that goes towards childcare. Your employer pays your nursery directly, and you keep your current nursery — it works with any setting that’s registered with Ofsted (England) or the Care Inspectorate (Scotland).

Crucially, there’s no government cap on the amount, unlike Tax-Free Childcare (which is limited to £2,000 per child per year). So for families with higher nursery costs or more than one child, the savings can be significant.

What it could save you (illustrative)

Your exact saving depends on your tax band, how much you pay in fees, and your circumstances — but here’s a rough sense of scale (illustrative only):

A basic-rate taxpayer saves roughly the 32% they’d otherwise pay in Income Tax and National Insurance on the fees they put through the benefit.
A higher-rate taxpayer saves roughly 42% on those fees.
On £1,000 a month of nursery fees, that’s in the region of £320–£420 a month less coming out of your take-home pay (illustrative).

Want a figure for your own situation? Try the savings calculator — it gives you a personalised estimate in a couple of minutes.

Why it has to come from your employer

This is the part that catches people out. The workplace nursery benefit is a workplace benefit — it runs through payroll, so only your employer can switch it on. You can’t sign up for it directly as an individual the way you can with Tax-Free Childcare. If your employer doesn’t offer it, the route to getting it is to ask them to set it up.

That can feel like a big ask. It isn’t. Here’s why it’s an easy yes for them.

It’s designed to be cost-neutral for your employer

The most common reason employers haven’t offered the benefit is that they assume it’s expensive or complicated to run. It isn’t — and that’s exactly the reassurance you can give them.

It’s cost-neutral. Modern software makes the benefit cost-neutral for the employer to run — they’re not subsidising your childcare, they’re facilitating a tax-efficient way for you to pay for it.
They can save too. Because the fees come from pre-tax salary, the employer’s own National Insurance bill on that portion goes down — so offering it can actually save them money.
It’s low-effort to set up. The compliance and admin are handled by the software, not by your HR team manually.
It helps them keep great people. A benefit that puts hundreds of pounds a month back in parents’ pockets is a genuine retention and recruitment win.

How to raise it: a step-by-step

1. Find the right person

Aim for whoever owns employee benefits. In most organisations that’s HR or a People / Reward team. In smaller companies it might be the finance lead, an office manager, or a founder. If you’re not sure, your line manager can usually point you to the right person.

2. Keep the first ask short

You don’t need to explain the whole scheme. Your job is just to put it on their radar and make it easy for them to look into it. A two-line message is plenty to start.

3. Lead with the cost-neutral point

The single most reassuring thing you can say is that it’s designed to be cost-neutral and can even reduce the employer’s NI. That removes the biggest objection before it’s raised.

4. Point them to a resource

Offer a place they can read more so the research isn’t on them. That makes it far more likely they’ll act.

A message you can copy and paste to HR

Feel free to adapt this — but it works as-is. Just fill in the brackets:

Hi [Name], I wanted to ask whether we’d consider offering the workplace nursery benefit (under Section 318 ITEPA 2003). It lets employees pay their registered nursery fees from pre-tax salary, saving the Income Tax and National Insurance on those fees — which can be hundreds of pounds a month for parents like me. The reason I’m raising it: it’s designed to be cost-neutral for the company to run, and because the fees come from pre-tax salary, it can actually reduce the employer’s National Insurance too. So it’s a real benefit for staff at little or no cost to us. There’s a clear overview for employers at halobenefits.co.uk/for-employers if useful. I’d be very happy to share more or connect you with the right people. Thank you for considering it — [Your name]

The link in that template points to Halo for employers — the page written specifically for HR, reward and finance teams, covering the compliance and the cost-neutral setup.

If your employer is hesitant

Sometimes the first answer is a cautious “we’ll look into it.” If it stalls, here’s how to gently keep it moving:

Reassure on cost. Repeat the cost-neutral point — and that it can lower the employer’s NI. Money is almost always the real hesitation.
Reassure on admin. The compliance is handled by the software; HR aren’t taking on a manual, risky scheme.
Frame it as retention. Benefits that genuinely help parents are powerful for keeping and attracting talent — especially in a tight hiring market.
Make it concrete. Mention how many parents at the company might benefit, and point them to the employer resources so they can see how straightforward it is.

How to check if your employer already offers it

Before you ask, it’s worth a quick check — some employers offer it quietly under a benefits-platform name you might not recognise:

Search your staff benefits portal or intranet for terms like “workplace nursery”, “salary sacrifice childcare” or “nursery benefit”.
Check your payroll or benefits documentation, or any benefits summary you got when you joined.
Ask HR directly — “Do we offer the workplace nursery benefit?” is a perfectly normal question.

How it compares to Tax-Free Childcare

Many parents already use Tax-Free Childcare and assume that’s the best option. The two are different, and for some families the workplace nursery benefit saves considerably more. Here’s a side-by-side:

	Workplace nursery benefit	Tax-Free Childcare
How you save	Fees paid from pre-tax salary — you save Income Tax + NI	Government tops up your account by 20%
Annual cap	No government cap	£2,000 per child per year
Who sets it up	Your employer (via payroll)	You, directly with the government
Best for	Higher fees, multiple children, higher earners	Lower fees, those whose employer doesn’t offer the benefit
Your nursery	Any Ofsted / Care Inspectorate registered setting	Any registered provider signed up to the scheme

Workplace nursery benefit vs Tax-Free Childcare (general comparison — check what’s right for you).

Note: you generally can’t use Tax-Free Childcare and a salary-sacrifice childcare benefit for the same child at the same time, so it’s worth comparing which leaves you better off.

Next steps

If your employer doesn’t offer it yet, the most useful thing you can do today is send that message to HR. It costs you two minutes and could save you a lot.

Get a personalised estimate with the [savings calculator](/calculator).
See everything in one place on the [for parents](/for-parents) page.
In the meantime, [find your nursery](/find) and check it’s registered — almost all are.

And when you talk to HR, send them to Halo for employers so they can see how simple and cost-neutral it is to offer.

This is not tax advice. Actual savings depend on your circumstances, employer participation, and nursery costs.