Parents feel the school fee crunch

MANY South African schools, especially government schools, may be heading for a cash crunch. More and more parents are defaulting on school fees payments or seeking relief by applying for exemption from paying fees. This is according to audit, tax and business advisory company, BDO.

“In our experience, there is a definite increase in non-payment of school fees and a huge decrease in recoverability,” said Sally Juckes of BDO.

“This broad trend is evident at pre, middle and high school level and reflects the decline in government funding and the financial

difficulties many parents are experiencing,” Juckes added.

Chelsea Preparatory School’s principal, Clive Nel, said it is true to say that parents are feeling the pressure of school fees and said the school’s facing more parents aware of their rights and applying for subsidy.

She said government school audits have shown increases in school fee remissions, where parents receive full or partial exemption from paying school fees for reasons of affordability.

“In certain instances, remissions are up to 50 per cent, but this is exceptional as most are between the 25 to 35 per cent mark, thus affecting a school’s income from fees significantly.”

“On the other hand, there is also a growing understanding that quality education will not be provided by the state and parents will need to support state schools as an option to making use of a very expensive private school. The reality is that not

everyone can afford private schools,” Nel said.

“Due to below inflation rate salary increases over the past two years and the rising cost of living, it seems that more and more parents with children at government schools are struggling to pay school fees.”

Private schools largely escape these difficulties, because they employ professional debt collectors and are quick to hand over accounts in arrears.

Offsetting funding shortfalls

With less money coming in and their costs risings, government schools are increasingly seeking ways to make up shortfalls in funding.

“For schools fortunate enough to have built up reserves, they will start dipping into these, bearing in mind that this should only be a temporary measure.” Juckes said.

She said limited fee increases are another possibility: “Government schools are already battling to get parents to pay and there are limits on how much more they can charge. While private schools can get away with increases of eight to 10 per cent for 2014, government schools will have to stick strictly to inflation-linked increases.”

This leaves fundraising as one of the most viable ways for schools to overcome their funding constraints.

According to Juckes, fundraising can be highly effective because parents find it less painful than the financial blow of absorbing hefty fee increases into their household budgets.

“As long as you limit the number of fundraising events, most parents are happy to contribute in whatever way they can.”

Schools are most likely to succeed with their fundraising drives if they tap into pupils’ creativity and parental pride in their children’s achievements.

“At the end of the day, inflation-linked fee increases and creative fundraising are a good combination that could tide schools over during hard times, without unduly adding to the financial burdens of parents.”

But Nel said he doesn’t agree that fundraising is the solution: “By this I mean the traditional forms of fundraising such as fetes, cakes sales and raffles. The modern parent simply does not have the time to give to the school, and the band of willing workers is diminishing rapidly. Raffles in particular are becoming most unpopular.”

Nel said what does need to happen is that schools must look at using non intrusive forms of fundraising such as advertising, loyalty cards and sponsored spelling or maths competitions, or sandwich drives, which happen in school and do not impose on the parents’ time. In the foundation phase parents are still keen to support fun days and such, but as the children grow older

the workers diminish.

*Other local government schools failed to comment.