To feel it’s a motherhood penalty… AIBU?

After school club

Most employers will offer flexibility for parents in terms of flexible working arrangements, compressed hours, part time etc.

However business hours are set for a reason and if it's part of your role and contract then yes it's completely unreasonable to just be unavailable for a few hours of the day and expect those without children to pick up the slack.

I work in social work and have set core hours I have to work. I can't just be unavailable for a few hours during the day as there could be an urgent query or emergency I have to attend too. Same with most public facing jobs.

Again with big corporate firms too, these also have a degree of collaborative working, meetings etc and it is unreasonable for these to be scheduled around someone's school pick up time.

So you're expecting to get paid for the time you've also supervising a child?

Why can't you use after-school club?

This is nothing about penalising mothers, this is about a business wanting your full attention during the hours for which you're being paid to work. Pay for childcare like many other mothers do.

They are offering flexibility by reducing the hours. If OP doesn’t want to reduce her hours she needs to use childcare like everyone else does!

Obviously it doesn’t matter but why should they pay you the same as someone who is available all the time? This kind of parental entitlement is what infuriates childfree colleagues and those with older kids.

Flexibility for parenting comes at a cost.

you could choose to buy child care. I personally made the choice to reduce my salary because of my individual child’s needs. We could still live comfortably though.

Personally I think it's very short sighted of employers not to allow some flexibility around parenting. As long as you do the required work and the required hours, does it really matter if you're unavailable for an hour or two?

YABU I’m afraid OP. Utilise childcare, that’s what it’s for. Work need you to be available during core hours, so either take the pay cut and be able to collect DD at 3.30pm, or work full time hours and pay for afterschool club like the rest of us!

Why can’t you pay for childcare like everyone else?

No it’s not a motherhood penalty, the same would apply if you were a single father…ffs!

Why can’t your child go to ASC?
I wouldn’t allow someone to be carrying on with work knowing there is a young child in their care and probably disturbing them neither

YABU. They are being very flexible on hours, they've accommodated school hour working to meet your childcare needs. As a childfree woman, I actually feel like it's a penalty to CF women if mothers (or fathers) are allowed to pop out at school run time while I'm expected to work core hours. You shouldn't be caring for a child while working.

I was thinking this. Might not be much of a pay rise from where The OP is now but less time working... presumably she can go back up to full time when the kid is older too if she wants.

Can you find some childcare from 3.30?

It sounds like they have made a very reasonable compromise. Either arrange other childcare for after school or accept the reduced hours and collect your child yourself.

lots of people need to change hours around children. It’s part of being a parent!

Nothing g to do with motherhood, they wouldn't allow a father to do it either by the sound of it

I imagine there’d be a lot of those. There certainly would be if I managed her.

If they’re paying that kind of salary (and even if they’re not tbh), they are entitled to expect your full attention without you doing childcare during working hours.

And if she’s expected to join an important short notice call at 3:00 one day? For an urgent matter that means she can’t say “sorry I’m actually too busy with something I can’t mention”?

It's not a motherhood penalty but rather a reasonable expectation of employment. If you're needing to pick your DD up at 3.30 and look after her after school then you can't expect your work to be paying for your time when you're not working.

I'm a parent and there are core hours I have to work. I have to pay for childcare to fit round these hours just like every other parent and what my parents had to do to. I'd be pissed off if people were being paid the same and expected to work the same hours but nipping off halfway through the afternoon to do a school pick up.

I’m sure they will notice the OP not being responsive or able to commit to any meetings around the school pick up window.

I’d be inclined to go back and say ‘It’s sorted. I’ll work full time for 95k thanks v much.’ And I’d just carry on nipping out and picking her up, or do afterschool club a few days, a playdate here and there and just make it work.

Like others have said it depends on how old she is. Tricky to WFH with her there if she’s 4, anything 7 and over should be much easier.

On that salary, you don’t really count hours outside of the normal working day, and especially when you have kids with you.
They want you working during traditional ‘working hours’. You can’t do that. It’s actually generous of them to offer you the reduced pay with curtailed hours. They could have just said you were not what they were looking for, since they wanted you full time (traditional).

YABU