Should I complain?

[MrsDermotOLeary]

I need some perspective about something that happened at the weekend, not sure whether or not it merits a complaint.

DH and I took our 3 DC swimming at a local pool. It has a toddler pool, rapids, two water chutes etc, very family orientated. The DC are aged 8,5 & 2.

The rules for the water chutes state that children of any age can go on an adult's lap, solo riders must be 8 years or older and at least 120cm tall. So DH and I took the 5 and 2 year olds on our laps and 8 year old rode by herself, which she loved.

One time we climbed up to the top, 8 year old wishes to go last so we can all wait at the bottom for her and she can splash us. So DH & I go down with the younger DC. We wait for DD but she doesn't appear. After a couple of mins someone else comes down the chute. So I climb up to the top to find DD.

When I get there, DD is crying and obviously distressed. Member of staff at the top is ignoring her. DD clings to me and begs me to take her home. She refuses to go down the slide so we go down the steps. She won't tell me what's wrong.

That night she was still very upset about it all. She says the member of staff had said "I can't let you ride." DD said "Why?" And the woman said "because you're underage."
Unfortunately DD was too shy to argue but panicked as she thought we wouldn't know where she was. She cried and the woman ignored her. Obviously she has to supervise the flume.

DD is 8 and 134cm tall. There's no way she looks underage. Plus the woman had seen me chatting with DD whilst holding my 2 year old, she could have asked me.

DD is still upset when I ask her about it. It's really bothered her that the woman thought she was lying. Should I just forget about it? DH wants to email a complaint.

You are within your rights to complain, it was a bit shit of the woman to do that, she needs a bit of retraining if nothing else.

I'm not bothered that she was doing her job, what bothers me is that she didn't ask DD her age, and also that she just left DD at the top of the flume all upset by herself.

Agree, Leisure centre should be informed so training procedures can be updated.

I'm surprised that if they make an issue of that sort of thing that they don't mark the wrist band as being a child over 8.
Your daughter didn't say 'I'm 8'?
So the woman didn't think she was lying, just that she was underage.

Next time send her down in the middle. I would email but I imagine they will quite rightly tell you it is at the attendants discretion to determine a child's age in the absence of parents and their was nothing more she could do for crying dd as the attendant had to monitor the flume. Sorry for your dd it was not a pleasant experience.

Just to clarify one of you should stay at the top until she goes down.

yes, I agree that she's not mature enough to be left without adult support at the moment. That's not a criticism of your DD, but if she's shy and cries and worries, you need to be within reach until she learns how to cope.

To be fair to the attendant Its not like she could of left the flume to take her down.

She had been going down in the middle but wanted to go last and splash us all. And I wasn't absent. She saw me holding DD's hand and carrying my toddler. No one else was behind DD at that point, we were the only ones there. If she'd asked me I'd have told her.

No but she could have called someone up. She could have spoken to me when I collected DD from the top but she ignored us both. She could at least have spoken to DD.

To be really honest, I wouldn't complain unless the staff member had been 'nasty' to your child.
AT worst it was an unfortunate misunderstanding.
I would take the opportunity to have a chat with DS that sometimes in life situations like this happen and we feel upset, which is fine - but would go over with her what she could have said or done differently.

Your DS may be a bit sensitive but I really do think that these sort of incidents teach us to be a bit less sensitive if they are not always 'fixed' for us.

It's hard to say.

Maybe your daughter panicked once left alone, and the attendant didn't feel it was safe to let her ride?

Or she might well just be a nasty cow who likes to makes small children cry.

Either way tho, she shouldn't have been left to cry.