I’ll start… we currently Charge £14 per month which we collect via Direct Debit (GoCardless) so loose a % as service charge.
Of this £3.50 is collected by Wing to be passed up (£1 + £2.50) but they don;t charge for August/December if i recall correctly.
So it works out at £1.75 per parade night based on a 4 week month, not bad for 2.5hrs childcare and that’s before we do any weekend activities.
Maybe we are under charging then at £8 and if there are siblings we have one at half price, !2 for 2 or if three from same family £16 for 3 buy 2 get one free!
Do you think we are wrong? We do not fund a SOV
Personally I think you are nuts charging less than £15 nowadays. That would give you so much headroom to buy in activities where you don’t have instructors for example.
You’d be surprised what people will pay for free childcare, and if you do some back of the fag packet maths on what they get for their £15 a month you’d be amazed at the value for money.
We are at £7 per cadet per month by standing order. It is generally sufficient.
GoCardless look like something it could be worth looking into.
Not necessarily wrong. We are similar and via standing order, although were planning tabling an increase to £10 at the AGM. We haven’t had an increase in about 15 years so thought it was about time with other costs going up. £10 seemed a reasonable increase to propose from where we are with the view that we could increase again in a couple of years.
We don’t have an SOV.
We possibly don’t do this enough, although generally charge ad-hoc if we do.
Our ongoing costs that this has to cover are;
I now have a sqn of 67 cadets, so we have a decent surplus to allow for funding support / kit purchases.
Will be asking the civcom to start setting some funds aside for a replacement SOV so we don’t get caught short
Off the top of my head, I think this would leave us in the red for 3 siblings and only the “half price” value for 2 (just from GPF payments).
EDIT: no, wrong, I was basing that on 1 full, one half, one free as opposed to the £16 that was right there, staring me in the face 
£15/month, standing order.
My previous squadron was £12 per month, for a squadron of Circa 65 cadets.
The squadron had an extensive flight suite, two minibuses (until recently, now one), adventure training kit, fieldcraft kit, and still fundraised
£14/month, direct debit
We are £8 per month by standing order. Have 2 minibuses, extensive AT and other equipment. We do fundraise a lot though.
We charge £75 a term (or free for those on hardship scholarships - for whom all activities and equipment - including IACE - are funded by the the school)
£15 PM, through Standing Order (although we are in a poor area, so a couple of kids pay cash at a reduced rate, because their parents don’t have bank accounts with So facilities).
Our only costs are subs to WHQ and beyond, and the phone/broadband subscription.
We used to charge £12, and I felt horrendously guilty until my daughter joined Rainbows. They pay for their uniform, badgebook, and all trips out, and charge £2.50 PH. We issue free uniform,3822’s, longer hours, and can offer cheap accommodation, free travel, cheap/free food on overnight activities, and all at £1.33 PH.
We charge £10.50 per month by Standing Order only. I personally think that’s a bit low so will be pushing to go to £12. (Which is what my old unit charged).
I’d love to go to 12 as there’s a lot of stuff I want to buy/replace, but bit too much of a leap in one go.
We have reasonable funds available and (had been) planning medium uplift in fundraising, but replacement of what comes out of our pockets and then future replenishment requirements and increase in activity would need a bit extra from where we are.
One childs squadron, due to clash of days with prefered unit, is £20 per month and they claim gift aid. The other childs is £12.50 + gift aid. Units approx 4 miles apart
They better be giving away gold watches to anyone who times out…
We charge £10/month but there isn’t much spare cash in the sqn at the minute. Don’t do much fundraising either, though. Oh, and still using cash to collect £2.50 weekly 
How many cadets and how long does this take?
I don’t understand how any unit operates this way as the norm and not an exception.
About 20 cadets a night, takes a solid 10 mins by the time whichever staff member says what they want to say, the cadets run to their bags because they forget their money and it actually gets collected and ticked off.
It’s stupid.