Message from childminder

Would you work for £18.38 for an afternoon? I certainly wouldn't! If you think this is tough, you are really in for quite a wake up call. Especially if you're looking for a childminder for one three hour period a week.

She gave you 6 weeks notice. How is that unreliable?

Why are you fed up with this? Apart from continue to make arrangements for a day that she is no longer available, what would you want her to do differently? She has given you updates when your child is in her care, she has given you plenty of notice to make new arrangements and she has been polite and professional in her message. What else should she have done?

I agree with PPs that it is not shit and does my make her unreliable

Just this past week someone in my circle was saying they're moving their child from the CM to nursery and felt bad but it worked better for them and most people said yes do what's best for you and don't feel bad.
Only a few days later someone said they were annoyed their CM could no longer do a certain day and everyone agreed it was rubbish.

Surely being able to give notice goes both ways?

The CM's circumstances may have changed and she's entitled to give notice or should she just keep working Fridays until you decide you no longer need her?

You're not somewhere beginning with C are you? Similar thing happened to me.

TBH you’ve got to kind of get used to this with childminders, they’re generally fab and I couldn’t have had a career without them but very common for them to change their availability as essentially most of them do childminding as it’s work they can fits in within whatever suits their family/life best. I often find new ones are initially very flexible and then hone down to what better suits them realistically once they realise not so difficult to get business

Yabu
most places would not allow one afternoon a week to start with due to settling in purposes.
and no she is not being unreasonable, she has given more notice than others would and she doesn’t sound unreliable at all.
unreliable is letting you down on the day or v little notice , but she’s giving you plenty as other people have said and worded it well.
if she only has your dc and her own that day , then maybe her own is wanting her attention and she’s finding it hard with both and wants a day for them to spend time together, it could be many different reasons but it’s irrelevant , she’s entitled to change her hours and days of work to suit her life. And this doesn’t make her unreasonable or unreliable.

@discombobulaty -how many hours does she have your daughter?

If you're only doing one afternoon a week, it's not much income for them and sounds like it's not worth it. I think all childminders should take Friday afternoons off. They work such long hours, it's deserved!

These things happen, OP. Inconvenient for you but I would say 6 weeks is enough time to find new arrangements

Gosh you're in for a long hard road if you think this is shit!

Polite message, plenty of notice, completely reasonable.

Fridays are always quiet at nurseries my DC attended so she probably can't get enough children on that day to make it work.

Why? If she had given a week's notice, I might agree with you, but five weeks? C'mon.

YABU, you got notice and plenty of it. She isn't mandated is a business she obviously has to refuse money for a reason.

Even then, nurseries close without warning! We had one local to us shut last year, parents were emailed at 7pm and had no childcare with immediate effect. This will happen more and more in the current financial climate.

The point is, circumstances change, even yours OP. Would you like to be held to a contract which no longer works for you?

I would imagine that these are circumstances beyond her control and even if it is not she is giving you lots of notice I think she is being very professional. She could have easily only given you a week notice. Sometimes you need to not take things personally and realise that other things are happening outside people's work.

Of course she's not being unreliable she's giving you plenty of notice.

I very much doubt she wants such a part time arrangement. There are myriad reasons she could be doing this but she owes you very little.

One afternoon a week is probably not enough for your child to settle in easily anyway.

Peoples circumstances change, she has given you fair notice. If you needed complete certainty of set hours you should have gone with nursery over childminder.

I don’t see how it shows this. For whatever reason she is unable to look after your child on that particular afternoon, she’s given you notice of this. Unreliable would have been her cancelling at the last minute or being late etc

How so? She gave plenty of notice and she could have a very valid reason for changing her hours, not that she has to share that reason with you. Doesn't mean she is unreliable, its life ffs