The mother of four says Sodexo had always alerted parents a month before their vouchers expired. However, as she had not logged in for almost 12 months, she did not realise it had changed its terms and conditions which stated it would no longer be sending notifications.

As our source highlighted, parents would only be aware of this update if they had been regularly accessing their account. If, like her, they had no need for the vouchers during that time, they would have been left in the dark.

After she shared her situation at work, she found several of her colleagues had also lost hundreds of pounds without realising.

Confused, the reader contacted the provider, Sodexo and was told that its childcare vouchers expire after 18 months and it was company policy not to re-issue vouchers once they expire.

She says after a “prolonged email conversation with Sodexo involving at least five different people”, the consultant and her husband eventually got the vouchers re-issued.

She said: “How is this fair? It’s taking advantage of busy people who may not have needed to use the scheme at the time or had a temporary alternative arrangement in place.