After School Cub worker drove DD home and left her there!

[Crabapple99]

I have an arrangement with one afterschool club worker that she takes my 10 year old daughter home for me once a week. Yesterday she was called away on a family emergency. Howerever, I wsn't contacted and told. If I had been, I would have left work early and collected DD myself. A different member of staff, one who I don't like much, and certainly wouldn't ever invite into my home, closed up the after school club 20 minutes early (DD was the only child left) forced DD to get into the car, drove her home, came in and looked around, then left her there alone. DD was very upset, as she hadn't wanted to get into the car. She has been told never to get into a car with anyone, even someone we know, unless she has permission from myself, her school teacher or one or two specific family friends. She did not have permission to get into this persons car, and I would not have agreed to this person driving my child anywhere, or to coming into my home. I tried to complain, but the after school club do not seem to think anything untoward has happened, and say the staff member was doing me a favour!

mine go to wrap around care at school which is on the school site

DD1 had to be in school 15 minutes early for an event she was taking part in so I asked the club to let her go over to school at 8.30 -they couldn't do this because I had signed them into their care, a member of staff leaving with her to take her to the hall would mean they dropped below their ratios and the children are not allowed to leave the club without and adult
the teacher went over and fetched her instead

our ASC would never only have one member of staff with a child or let a child leave by themselves at primary age

they do take children up to the age of 14 after school and they are expected to walk down from the high school by themselves but cannot then leave until they are collected by an adult (there are only 2 high school kids that use the club)

I'm always the last to collect -I pay until 6pm and usually get there about 5 to and there are always 2 members of staff there

I would report them to OFSTED personally

Oh well ok, but it really isn't the lady who did you a favour you should be pissed off with imo...it's the lady you 'employ' now and then to take your DD home.

Worraliberty, I haven't spoken to the woman who normally does it yet, she is still dealing with family problems. DD did however argu as long as she dared about wanting me to be contacted, and not wanting to get into the car, but in the end she is 10, and this woman is in authority over her, and she did as she ws told.

I am amazed that 14yo's would need to go to an afterschool club.. by that age I was either in my own afterschool club (detention).. or hanging around with my mates... arriving home in time for dinner.

Ok but it's still you 'employee's' fault for not contacting you and asking someone else to take your DD home.

There's no point in being annoyed with the woman who took her home is there?

Wow, yanbu.

I pay for an after school club. We have to declare anyone who can take our kids out of the building. I have myself, dp, mil and fil. Anyone else I ask in an emergency I have to call them up and give them a password. I still call them up to say mil or fil.

No way would I expect them to close 20 mins early and drop my child off at my home. What happens is, one of the designated adults (that'd include that staff member) doesn't pick up at closing, then you get a big fee added. They try to contact, after that it's not long until social services are called. I've always assumed this is the norm. Not that someone will close early and drop the child off to an empty house without knowing the situation of the parents.

The agreement is with you and that member of staff? I presume it's a separate private agreement and not to do with the after school club. My 10 yr old is used to being at home by himself, he has a mobile, he can use a phone, he would be upset being taken home in those circumstances.

Again, why are you using an ASC that employs people who call your daughter names?

squeaky toy

one of the 14 year olds as aspergers so the mother won't leave her alone afterschool (understandable)

the other has a younger sister at the primary and the parents don't collect until just before me and live about 20 minutes away -I gues they just don't want their 11 year old going home from school to an empty house for several hours every night of the week

they have a few more yr 7 & 8 in the school holidays though

I have a standing arrangement with 3 other mothers that I'll pick their sons up from an off-site playing field every Friday. Once I couldn't make it so my mother stepped in.

No-one was panic stricken or alarmed. Even tho' she took them home & introduced them to her builders.

By all means report this; they handed over the care of your child for a full 20 mins before they were supposed to; but possibly the absence of the bona fidi member of staff meant they had too.

Do you honestly think that shutting the club early with no warning and dumping a 10 year old girl at home alone in the dark is doing someone a favour? Having, apparently, shouted at the girl to get in the car?

Wow YANBU and I can't believe anyone thinks you are! You pay for her to be looked after by an ASC, they can't just arbitrarily decide to close 20 minutes early and take her home to an empty house! That's outrageous. When there's a problem (like staff members personal problems) someone should contact you. I don't care if other people's 10 year olds would be perfectly happy in that situation, you have decided that you are not happy for your dd to be in that situation and that is why you pay to have her looked after. As you have said if they had contacted you then you would have been able to go there yourself to get her. There was absolutely no need for this at all.

She was not doing you a favour. She closed up early and left an upset child home alone without her parents knowing while she was being paid to look after her! That's really not ok.

I think it's probably ofsted that you need to contact. And if it were me I would not be sending my DD back there. In combination with the teasing about the birthmark that would really break my trust with them.

YANBU
The ASC worker should not have taken your daughter anywhere, without your permission.
There should always be two members of staff on duty and in the event of an emergency, the parents should be contacted and asked to come and collect their child.
I appreciate the other worker had an emergency to deal with, but she could have texted you or phoned you. It would have taken seconds. If she couldn't because of the nature of the emergency, then the other worker should have phoned you.
Their proceedures sound very lax.
I would maybe ask to see the manager and ask about their policies and proceedures and ask them to reassure you that this won't happen again.

What I can't understand is why on earth the ASC woman did not phone you for permission. She was opening herself up to massive potential problems (no public liability insurance, risk assessments, etc etc if she had had an accident). THe ASC have your number so why on earth did they not cover themselves by letting you know?)
Surely a 2 minute phone call to you would have resolved this? Why didn't she ring?

YANBU but at 'forced' dd into car. And I wonder if you aired your grievance rather hotly?

To those who say the dd should have said something. I have a 10 year old - he's bright and sensible but he wouldn't have said anything. No matter what you tell them about not getting lifts unless you've expressly agreed it, they think adults are right and know best. Very unfair to blame the child.

mmmmmm!

YANBU. I think this is awful. They should have contacted you and then waited with your DD until you could collect her even if that meant going past closing time (although I guess you may have had to pay extra for this). I can't understand why they thought it was OK to do this with out phoning you. I'd be really annoyed at ASC closing early too if you pay for childcare to 6pm you are entitled to expect your DD to be there until that time.

I've just come to this so have read the four pages together.

I'd be extremely upset too - there's at least one poster on here who is being seemingly deliberately obtuse and not listening to what you are saying about the circumstances.

I'd have serious concerns about the whole ASC set up to be honest. It seems very casual to me that the remaining worker can just decide to shut up shop 20 mins early without letting you know and then assume responsbilitiy for driving your daughter home, with no written or even attempted verbal permission. I'd be thinking carefully about making a written complaint and asking them to clarify their procedures.

And I'd also be thinking carefully about sending my daughter somewhere where she can't trust the workers to treat her with respect (the birth mark comments). I'd either have made a complaint about the woman (sounds a nasty piece of work) or I'd have looked for a different arrangement.

Its hard to see how she can go back to ASC next week without this being sorted out.

I had (until recently when he turned 11) a 10yo who was perfectly capable of taking himself home and waiting for me in the dark and who indeed did so every afternoon. Fine.

But I still think the approach of the people running this club is very casual; if you have paid for the club the other person should have kept it running until normal hours and waited for your friend to turn up and the first woman should have contacted you. Anything semi-official like this should have procedures in place.

When dd's disabled transport driver turned out to be dangerous on the roads (crashed into school gates and HT's car) the headteacher did drive her home but she rang me to explain- and dd was 13 at the time, so plenty old enough to look after herself.

I wouldn't be terribly upset about this, but I would think they were a bit sloppy.

I think the worst part about this is the shutting of the ASC early.

When my DCs went to after school club I paid them to collect them from school at 3:15pm and then look after them until 6:00pm, I usually got there about 5:55pm sometimes a bit before [never late!]

If I had turned up at 5:40pm to find it closed and my children not there I would have been extremely worried, more so if no one had contacted me.

They cant just close up early like that.

Can you explain why if they closed twenty minutes early all the other parents were notified but you were not? It just doesn't make sense.

Presumably the club closed early due to some sort of ratio issue?

The situatio as you explain it isn't ideal but i am at a loss to understand why your ire is directed to the woman who dropped your DC home, your complaint should be with your employee and given that she has some sort of ongoing family issue it would surely be appropriate to cut her some slack.

In the meantime I perhaps you ought to give some thought as to why you leave your DC in the care of someone you neither trust nor like and who has apparently behaved appallingly towards your dd. Very odd behaviour

I imagine the other parents has simply already collected their children. Not everyone leaves it right to the end I guess.

Don't you think the employee who dropped this child home and then left her there alone was in the wrong?

The situation with the ASC worker who sometimes brings your DD home is a bit of a red herring as you hadn't triggered that situation at that point.

What happened is that another ASC worker shut the club 20 minutes early and took your DD to your house, without informing you at any stage, while you went to the ASC to collect her. She was then unexpectedly in the house alone for an hour.

I'd write to the ASC manager expressing your shock and disappointment and asking

1. Is it normal practice to close early without informing parents
2. Is it normal practice for her staff to take children in their own cars without permission of the parent and what are the insurance implications of such an event
3. Who does she feel was responsible for your child after she had been left alone at your house, while you were on your way to the ASC ?

I am probably going against the grain here, but from the clubs perspective, but at 10, your dd should be able to understand about circumstances changing, she should be able to trust that an after school club worker, albeit a different one to the usual, could actually take her home, and she should be able to rationalize this, and be able to dial a number on the phone.

I also find it hard to believe you have so little thought out regards to "the unexpected" seeing that you have such shaky after school care arrangements. Like your mobile number written down next to your phone, or something.
It is shocking that a 10 year old cant use a phone, unless she has some special needs you are not telling us about.

I am really surprised that a 10 year old would be in hysterics about a change in her routine, that she is shaking so much that she cant use a phone.

Is she usually very precious? Molly coddled?

But yes, I do agree that the club should have contacted you. I dont understand WHY they would close early, rather than wait for you to come if the arrangement was that they would only drop her home if you were not in time for pickup. It seems ODD that they opted to close early, and take her home, rather than wait for you till closing time and see if a trip home was even necessary.

From THAT perspective, your dd was right to be upset, and she was right to try and stall, but it is still a shit situation, because at her age, she shouldnt have to.

I would contact the school and ofsted about this, to be honest. Because it could appear to be a case of the worker closing the club earlier rather than wait for you, to engineer a visit to your home...

I think there are two issues here: the ASC worker should not have brought the OP's DD home and left her alone after shutting the club early. Apart from anything else, as a teacher, we are told to avoid putting ourselves in situations where we will be alone with a student (such as in a car with them) if at all possible - so both the ASC workers are acting slightly surprisingly in this sense.

However, your daughter's reaction does sound rather extreme for the circumstances you describe and I think this has provided an ideal opportunity to try to find out why she is so scared of people that situations like this leave her shaking too much to dial a phone. Otherwise, she is going to find secondary school - where she will have numerous teachers, sports coaches and so on - very traumatic indeed.

At 10 years old if I had been shouted at to get in a car by someone who had previously bullied and potentially encouraged bullying of me by other children I'd be extremely upset. And I wasn't molly-coddled or any of the other things you suggest could be the cause of this 'odd' behaviour (which as I see it is completely understandable).

There's obviously at least one really decent ASC worker whom the OP trusts - not everyone will have the luxury of being able to find a perfect ASC where they love every worker so criticism levelled at the OP for leaving her daughter there is ridiculous.

When you really crystallise the issue here it is very obvious that both ASC workers acted irresponsibly and the way that the situation developed was not acceptable from start to finish.