To not pay this bill?

[whydobirds]

I'll try to keep this intelligible...

Dc attends wraparound care at school (not run by the school). It is invoiced for via paper invoices.

Except...I never get invoices. On occasion they will give one to dc, but it is usually wrong and needs correcting. On occasion they will put them in the register- they don't always get given out. Sometimes dc gets an invoice but loses it, or (and i only found this out tonight) sometimes they tuck them in an unused pocket in dcs bag so dc doesn't know they are there. Dc has ASD.

Dc mentioned to me in Christmas holidays thst there had been an invoice for 40 quid that they hadn't passed over to me. So I paid 40 quid.

Fast forward to Monday and the childcare had been through all their payments and realised i owed another 36. So i got an invoice for the 36 plus a late payment fee. Of 25 quid.

Their argument is I should have kept track of the childcare I had used, so I should have paid even if I didnt see invoices

Mine is that that isn't how business works, you pay when you get a bill or it just messes everyones accounting up, and last half term I spent a fair bit of time out of it on valium due to a severe injury to my back, so wasn't able to keep track of much - dcs dad, xh, was taking them in, but childcare still falls to me to pay.

I have tried to speak to them and explain that I didn't know I owed it as hadn't had the invoice so feel the late fee is unfair. They don't care, and the manager was really rude and aggressive to me. They have told me I lied about not receiving the invoices and that I lie about being in the playground every day to drop dc off. They've said they can't be expected to remember to ensure I get invoices brought to the door (when they hand everyone else's out), yet I am supposed to remember exactly what I have used. They told me they didn't give me the last invoice because dc told them i was skint (i wasn't and hadnt asked dc to say this), and that they don't want to invoice every week because it is a small amount, but then I am told I am lying when I say I had no knowledge of the invoice and I am told that they invoice me religiously every week (despite another member of their staff telling me they don't). I tried to explain that trying to keep track of things while on tranquilizers is impossible - they said they didn't care. I am told that I cannot rely on my child to twll me what I owe, yet they relied on my child telling them I was broke, and they rely on my child to deliver invoices.

On one occasion I received an invoice (one of the few I have had) via the teacher 3 days after the due date - I had to pretty much beg them to remove the late fee then, now they ate saying that that was a gesture of goodwill and they didn't have to do that.

If I refuse to pay the fine, they won't accept dc at the door, even though all childcare payments are now up to date. Dcs dad and I both start work well before school.
Feel like they've got me over a barrel. AIBU in thinking it's really not fair of them to do this, and that even if they believe I owe them the money, talking to me like a delinquent kid isn't on...and if IANBU, wtaf can I do other than acquiesce to someone who is fundamentally being a bully?

It doesn't sound as if you keep any records of child care but expect them to.

Surely it’s literally their business to do that though?!

My kids ASC never send me an invoice. I just send an internet banking payment over every week as they attend on the same days each week and their CCC are always the same. The onus is on me to pay it, not up to them to chase me for it. And am I not correct in thinking all childcare needs to be paid for in advance anyway? I know that’s always been the case with nurseries/ASC that my kids have attended 🤷🏽‍♀️

Geminijes, I think the fair share of the blame is none of it. If they can't track their own revenue then they shouldn't be in business.

They have flat refused to email invoices and only ever put an amount on them when they do issue so I never know which weeks are being billed and which aren't...

That's really bad.

When my own DCs were in primary, I had the ASC trying to invoice me for an additional £200 ish.

Lucky for me, I'd kept a spreadsheet right from the start and tallied all payments I'd made to this. I owed nothing.

Ours did have the facility to pay online, but you didn't have any way of knowing the time periods you were paying for, it was simply "ASC, X pounds"

I've just found this link from the GOV.uk website, which details what an invoice should contain. Sounds like they aren't meeting the minimum standard.

Most are in advance IME (we certainly are) but I suppose these guys might well not be - it wouldn't exactly surprise me!

Most clients don't want to pay weekly (and wouldn't pay weekly!), plus you have people paying by childcare vouchers, tax free childcare, payments from 3rd parties like colleges and universities. It's not reasonable to expect the clients to calculate their own bills and make a random payment then bill them if they don't.

Regardless of who is in the wrong, you need the childcare so you need to pay and keep a record of what you owe. Would you work for nothing? Do you expect your child to receive free childcare?

I certainly wouldn’t pay the late fee. It’s their responsibility to invoice correctly, communicate that to you and give you proper deadlines to pay by. I think they’d have a hard time in court if they wanted to recover the unpaid debt that way, given their current “system”.

Using your child as a messenger is totally inappropriate.

The ASC we use has third party online invoicing - we get the first one with details of sessions booked for the next half term, two weeks to confirm changes if needed, then the invoice follows with a deadline of the day before the first session invoiced, which is usually about a month.

If I were you I would start paying everything by BACS so you can keep track of it. And if all else fails, find another care provider!

It doesn't sound as if you keep any records of child care but expect them to.

They have to keep records so they know what to charge, she doesn't necessarily. If she assumes they are competent and honest, she can just pay what they tell her she owes when they tell her she owes it.

Surely you know your dc attends x amount of sessions pw and each session is x amount. Why don't you just pay weekly? This is up to you to know and pay.

Would you work for nothing? Do you expect your child to receive free childcare?

The money in dispute is a late fee. She is paying for the work done, she is only complaining about paying an additional penalty that is a consequence of their administrative incompetence.

Why on earth don't you keep track of what you owe? Write down in your diary when you last paid, and then you will know how many weeks you owe.

The money in dispute is a late fee. She is paying for the work done, she is only complaining about paying an additional penalty that is a consequence of HER administrative incompetence

Fixed that for you.

I'd agree with paying them by traceable methods only; if their system is this bad then I would not rely on them properly keeping track of payments. You shouldn't have to, but I would.

Assuming you want to keep using them I'd ask:
-WHat their expected payment frequency is
-When payments are due
-Are they in advance or arrears, and for what period
-what their rate is for each type of session

And then I'd email THEM at the required frequency stating what you've paid with an explanatory note stating they need to advise you within x days if it's incorrect.

Hell, I'll happily knock you up a spreadsheet to do it.

You absolutely should not have to do this, but I'm guessing they're the only care available.

Crimsonlake when you say Would you work for nothing I think you haven't realised that OP is happy to pay for the childcare. She's only disputing the late fee for an invoice she didn't receive.
Frankly OP if they haven't set out Kate charges, delivered invoices in an appropriate way and given dates by which it needs to be paid, they're not entitled to a late fee.
Given that OFSTED criticised their paperwork, I'd give them a headache and contact OFSTED to complain how they had your child to deliver invoices and pass financial messages, and you don't know what periods the invoices cover as they don't and won't say.

Nope, I'd thoroughly disagree ZeroFuchsGiven. Inconsistent invoice issuing via children is not a proper method. The incompetence is theirs. They're supposed to be professionals running a business, it's their responsibility to invoice accurately.

It's not HER incompetence. Blimey. Any company should invoice properly and breakdown the invoice. This is their job. Life is hard enough and anyone would be lying if they claimed they were on top of everything- unless they had too much time on their hands, which OP doesn't.

I run childcare.

I don't expect parents and carers to keep track of the care they use, that's my job, invoices are sent via email and parents pay by bank transfer unless they request a paper invoice...Which nobody ever does. Its really not complicated! No child, however reliable gets given an invoice...what a crap system.

Personally I would pay the £36 but only after they had provided a breakdown of their charges and details of where the shortfall came from. Hardly unreasonable.

I would not pay any late fee on account of them "discovering" you hadn't paid enough...if they didn't know how are you supposed to know?

And for those saying you need to pay and shouldn't expect free child care...when you need a plumber, do you make notes of what they did, how long it took, what parts they used and then pay them...or do you wait for them to invoice you and then pay? It's no different.

*It doesn't sound as if you keep any records of child care but expect them to.

Surely it’s literally their business to do that though?!*

I agree, it is their business to keep records but equally, wouldn't you keep a record of child care you need to pay rather than just rely on them? If you don't keep a record, then how do you know you are paying the correct amount?

Nope as a parent it is ops responsibility (or her ex) to know when and how long someone else is looking after their dc and pay for it!

You would be better calculating your own billing and sending that amount in at start or end of each month

I don't think you should pay the late payment fee no.

My child uses out of school care and every single month since September they've got the amount wrong or not given me one. Not got one yet this month. I never pay til I get the invoice and this means that I chase them ever month to either get one or get them to amend the wrong one. Because I don't want to have them come back at me. This is what you have to do.

But no I don't think you should pay the late payment fee.

Good to see another childcare provider in agreement!

I don't keep a record of what childcare I use and pay for it. I wait for the childcare provider to send me an invoice and then I pay it.

In what other business would it be acceptable to invoice by providing an invoice on paper to someone who is not even responsible for paying it (I guess children don't pay the invoice themselves!).

It would be like a builder giving your invoice to a random neighbour then complaining you didn't pay because you hadn't kept a tally of how many hours they worked.

Or someone self employed telling their customer to keep a tally of how much work they had done for them and pay what they owed!!

YANBU OP - it's utterly ridiculous that they give an invoice to a child and expect you to just find it. At dd's nursery, they do paper invoices, but they hand it to a parent at pick up time, so there is no question of it being lost.

For those saying thst their asc relies on parents to keep track, if the agreement was that I kept a check and paid up front then I would have done so. But i have used this cc provider for 6 years, they have always invoiced in arrears other than for the last week. I used to get the invoices handed to me by the lady who ran it and they always used to at least have the dates covered on them (although no they don't meet minimum standard). This is a recent problem since she left. I didn't receive an invoice for 10 weeks at one point, and when I did get it it was badly wrong because I had been trying to keep tabs and pay as I went. It took them about a week to sort that out, as they were adamant initially that I owed them an extra 80 quid or so as they had not taken my payment into account.

Utter rubbish Zero - invoicing is a legal requirement for tax reasons. Would you pay your council tax if you didn't get an invoice?
This blaming on Mumsnet is ridiculous sometimes. In the face of all reason and common sense someone will always blame the poster.
Being a parent can be a busy enough job for anyone, but OP works long days in her job. Why should she pay her childcare provider if they don't do their duties and invoice. Remember this was only a small part of one invoice. Not the whole thing.