Charged £90 for being 3 minutes late to collect children from nursery

[Justastorminabcup]

3 minutes late! I thought I was on time. nobody said anything when I arrived, they just sent me an invoice in the post.

I can understand that they need a system to prevent parents regularly being late. They have a business to run and staff to pay etc, but £90!?! For three minutes! How can they think this is reasonable???

I've used this nursery for 4 years and have never been late before.

AIBU to be utterly shocked that a childcare establishment who must know that many parents struggle to be able to afford daycare for their children could feel it is acceptable to charge such a fine? Is this normal? Would other care providers do this?

£45 per child is high, but not unreasonably so in my opinion (assuming it's intended to put people off being late, rather than to cover the cost of staffing). However, I do wonder about the three minutes - who timed this? Was it three minutes late arriving at the premises, or leaving them for example? It takes more than three minutes for me to collect DD - probably about 10 minutes form leaving the car to getting back into it or more if I'm chatting Given that it wasn't closing time and the staff were looking after other children too, it seems odd that anyone even noticed such a short period of time!

Were you delayed leaving work? Did your boss ask you something last minute?

If so, I would show her the invoice and say something like "you know you asked me to do/stopped to talk about X Y Z just before I finished work last week, and I left a couple of minutes late? Look at this piss-taking nursery, blardy pariahs, I cant believe they are fining me £90 for being 3 minutes late"

At least your boss will know why you have to leave bang on time. (You are not asking your boss to fork out!!! Just showing why you need to leave on time)

As I arrived in a very flustered fashion at nursery once on the dot of pick up time I was told politely but firmly that I was, in fact, late as the child has to be off premises by then and, obviously, there is the handover to do plus being shown whatever scribble they have done that day & those sorts of things. I had never really thought of it that way but it made sense and, since then, I have always aimed to be there no later than five minutes than five minutes before DS' pick up time.

I suspect it's to put off the usual suspects who will ALWAYS arrive late....

Who just refuse to understand the implications re ratios and insurance or the issues with paying staff unexpected last minute overtime... I was one of these staff... Many moons ago...I lost count of the number of rearrangements we had to make in our (me and colleagues) private lives to account for some one else's lack of good manners/organisation... The frequent offenders would often not contact you... Just not show.

We started a punitive late collection fee.... Sometimes these parents will still gassing on Costa..
..
Funnily these people who are always 'In traffic', or 'delayed unavoidably' , don't miss their holiday flights.... Without some sort of fine people will take advantage...

I don't think it is fair if it really is a first offence...

It won't have been a first offence. If you can arrive late without noticing she's probably done the same on countless occasions without noticing/apologising/caring.

Paul I don't understand your reasoning again- insurance companies- even if it were outside of usual hours, which it isn't - aren't so draconian that they finish cover at an exact time and don't insure anyone after that time of day

They are designed to fit within reasonable business needs. Its nothing to do with costs, if they stopped being insured at exactly closing time they would have to leave the building and stop conducting business, not stay there but charge you more. You're connecting things together which are unconnected, and inaccurate.

I'm miffed at all the people who seem to think if nursery minds your child until 6pm the staff can expect to be out and locking up an empty building at 6pm on the dot. That is not how it works at all.

That's exactly how insurance works in these situations They have insurance in place for their business times. Hence massive financial penalties for lateness: to avoid children being there when they shouldn't be. Don't see what is so bizarre about that. The financial penalties are there as a deterrant.

Also, major lols at insurance companies not being draconian. Are you for real? Insurance companies are scum.

That's not the case. My organisation is slightly different to a nursery but holds the insurance for nurseries premises as well as operating our own child care businesses (more like pre school) It doesn't work like that, I've seen the policies. You are still liable for situations on your Premises outside of hours and your cover reflects this.

Even if that was the case can you explain why it would be ok for the children and staff to be on the premises uninsured as long as someone paid them a late fee?

Whether or not insurance companies are "draconian", I am sure that "business times" don't assume that all staff and children are out of the door at exactly 6.p.m (or whatever the official closing time is).

Anotherusername1

I agree that is unfair, as a CM my DH doesnt charge for when he is not available e.g. his sickness and holidays.

Well that was rather uncalled for. Do you enjoy being nasty? A previous poster has mentioned what happened when she was late (being told the child had to be off the premises by the ) Want to call her a liar or something? Absolutely no need to be so rude to me. I was merely saying what I was told by a friend who worked in a nursery and what I knew from when my ds was at nursery. Nice to see you trying to pick on just me, never mind the others who disagree with you.

Paul you're embarrassing yourself.

Nurseries only get insured for working hours. It's certainly what nurseries tell everybody.

Surely if insurance does come into it it simply means that there have to be enough staff on hand at all times, which might mean someone staying a bit late to cover those conditions, when they would really rather go home on time of course.

It wouldn't mean that the children/premises were actually uninsured outside certain times.

So is that not the case Tiggy? It's fine for children to be there and it has no bearing on their insurance if the child was injured etc out with their business hours?

Ok. Now ima bit rusty on this, but By law, penalty clauses (such as his one) are not enforceable.

The charge should be a reasonable pre-estimate of loss. So extra staff costs, insurance, premed is etc.

If this were me I would speak to the nursery and say given the 3 minute time period the charge is utterly unreasonable.

Do you have a contract?

Pip I thought it was to do with if a child was injured etc. Clearly I was wrong. Nursery insurance covers kids being there whenever.

Sorry the hours you officially have children onsite

Well that was uncalled for. Especially since I literally just conceded I was wrong. I was misinformed and nurseries are covered all the time.

As far as I know it's just a made up thing to pressure parents not to be late.

If a parent were to beg "Just stay open a bit longer. Just for me. I spend £5000 per week here you know!", you can counter with "We'd LOVE to but our hands are tied. Insurance you know". You should be able to say "Look, the staff have lives with their own plans and responsibilities for after work." but there are too many cuntsomers about who don't care about the staff. The insurance excuse works better.

Wow op that's harsh.

I a cm and yes a very small minority of parents take the piss and for those I use the late fee and if continual I give notice as see it as a breach of our relationship and trust.

For my nice normal parents stuck in traffic or at a meeting I don't charge any extra and often get a not the of wine or flowers to say thanks.

Maybe look at a cm?

But don't tell anyone else.

Well you seemed pretty aggressive and certain earlier Paul, for someone who didn't actually know anything about it.