Child Invited To Birthday Party Parents Expected To Pay

Yeah that's ridiculous. Cheapskates.

So stressful for the host and the child!

There's a notorious drop and go parent in our class. At every party, the girl has started crying and asking for her mummy before the official end time and has gone missing a few times. It was luckily nothing sinister but caused by the chaos in a public area full of strangers while the hosts were distracted with other guests. There's usually a short panic while someone tries to locate the girl and it turns out she just wandered off or was taken to the loo by another parent. There have also been parties with a change of location that involved 10mins driving and someone else had to transport the girl and her sibling along, with or without the necessary car seats.

It’s usual practice at many parties. The party package is certain amount of children plus 2 adults free and any extra adults are not free. Simple.
Ime if you trust host parents and that they will cope with the amount of children at the party - you drop and run, if you are not sure that your particular child will cope - you pay to go in. You might share this cost with another parents so one of you will be looking for 2 children at this party and another one - at another party ( or any other favour)

When they’re 5-6 parents tend to stay, especially if in a public place, to help supervise.

But surely parents won’t have to pay if the child is joining a pre-paid party? They won’t be wanting to actually go on the soft play, only watch.

Is it really helicopter parenting to not leave your kids with strangers just because it’s a party? I’d happily pay - at my kids parties, I offer parents the choice of drop/stay and refreshments if they wish to stay - I’m always surprised by those who are happy to leave (and then don’t bother to answer their phone when there’s an issue with the child!).

Erm because the child is 5? Because other parents you probably barely know are usually ridiculously lax with supervision and probably don’t even know her kid’s face let alone name? Because soft plays are often open to the public at the same time and you have no idea who else is going to be there? Because the 5 year old might need the loo and need someone to help him with the lock depending on the venue’s facilities? Or maybe she just loves her kid and doesn’t want him being scared or alone or getting hurt without her there at such a young age?

What sort of party is it? Normally people leave 5or 6 year olds by themselves.

Have they asked the parents to stay? at that age i would say it’s drop off unless your child wants you to stay in which case you pay I had my daughters 6th birthday (oldest in class so everyone else 5) at a trampoline park, no parents stayed.

2 kids. Over 20 soft play parties. Definitely the significant of minority parents who stay. You don’t need to keep track of them. It’s soft play. Go forth and play!

Paying a younger kid into a public area is COMPLETELY normal.

If you want a PRIVATE party then privately hire somewhere.

Oh I was definitely amused, it was quite funny when I had a good look at her and thought hmmm who the hell are you?! 😂 It did mean that one of our actual party goers was still happily running round soft play too 🙈

How much? It is cheeky but I would pay as my DC loves parties.

Not really- we had a birthday party at a huge soft play with a capacoity to cordon off 5 or so areas for birthday parties and on the day they were all taken plus loads of random kids, so probably 100 or so kids on the venue. No one in their right mind would leave their child of that age.

DS did this at a soft play party; not quite as dramatic but sat down and sang happy birthday to the birthday girl with great gusto. Her parents were luckily amused rather than put out!

It is a soft play and many of them charge adults. I would pay to stay. I have done them before and also pay for the sibling myself. Nothing wrong with it.

It is cheeky, but just take the value off your entry, off whatever you were going to spend on a gift.

When my eldest turned 4 I had a soft play party for her, I had 11 or 12 kids dropped off, there was then a fire alarm and we had to go and stand outside in a busy town centre, managed to wrangle them all back inside and then when they sat down to eat I realised half way through that I didn't recognise one of the kids, she'd just decided she liked the look of the food and her poor mam was looking everywhere for her 😂

Anyway, after that I decided I wouldn't be dropping mine off at a party unless it was at someone's house

This isn’t my experience to be honest as there’s no way the host parent could keep track of them all. So you’d effectively be dropping your child unsupervised. I’m not a helicopter and am happy for DS to go into the soft play bit without me but there’s no way I’d drop him at the venue and then go home!

soft play parties are drop and run.

I really hate those kinds of venues, always think they are teetering on the edge of disaster so I can see why parents might want to stay. Tbh, if it was either pay to stay or not attending at all, I would lean towards declining the invitation unless it was a very good friend.

Drop and leave with younger kids at a large softplay is cheeky fuckery behaviour. You are essentially enjoying free childcare for the cost of a present. 5-6 year olds are not old enough to be fully unsupervised so it's slightly reckless to leave them completely alone and it adds to the stress of the hosting parent. This is of course is assuming attendance for parents are free (not the issue raised by OP here), although even if it needs to be paid for it seems most reasonable behaviour to supervise young children.

There is also the obvious safeguarding issue. Drop and go birthdays at a home party, private venue or supervised location (museum, workshop) are not a problem because you know where the children are at all times. Large soft place locations are always open to the public so it's virtually impossible to keep track of all the children at the same time. God knows what other people could be there as well and if they might try to interact with one of the children. You are essentially allowing your young child to be roaming free in a public place with hundreds of strangers for at least 2 hours. They could also be going to bathroom fully unsupervised.

We had a softplay party with free entry, food and drink for the parents too. There were still 10 drop and goes, with around 4 kids aged 5 or below. Despite our best efforts, it was absolutely impossible to keep track of all the children at once. I managed to at least spot and accompany all the unsupervised kids to the loo so they weren't at risk of total strangers. A public softplay is really not the same thing as a school or home.

The first soft play party I hosted was drop and run. I welcomed the kids in as they arrived but made no note of who had come. Suddenly realised when it was time for cake that I had no idea who I was responsible for.

That was a heart in the mouth moment. I didn't even recognise the children. Luckily it all worked out; parents turned up, their kids recognised them and everyone was accounted for but... that was a mistake I didn't make again

When DD was young, 5 was about the cut off point for whether parents stayed or dropped off. Before that we had the odd one or two parents who would leave them as young as 4. And at 5 just the occasional one who stayed with their child but most didn't. By 6 definitely everyone just dropped off and left them.

@Warrior96 better than finding out when you turn up that you have to pay. Everyone knows where they stand!