AIBU to expect a refund from nursery?

[RaeCJ82]

I'm fully prepared to be flamed for this but here goes. My DD's nursery closed when asked to in March and we'd already been told that we wouldn't be expected to pay anything during the closure period. We were told that the nursery email address should be used for any queries we had and to communicate any changes and this would be manned by the owner as all other staff were furloughed.
A couple of weeks later one of the managers, who was also my DD's keyworker, told us she was leaving - not via the email address I may add. Prior to the manager starting at the nursery our DD had quite a few keyworker changes which we were a little bit unhappy about, but DD really liked the current one. We emailed the nursery to ask if they had any plans for when nursery reopened after losing such a key member of staff and it being another change for DD. We never received a reply.
After Boris' announcement that nurseries could start to reopen we waited to see if we would receive any communication but didn't. We again sent an email with no response. About 8 days later we received a generic email to say they wouldn't be reopening in June.
My OH and I had been WFH and looking after our DD, which although actually being lovely, has also been difficult and DD definitely hasn't been receiving the full attention she needs, although we've done our best. We decided under the circumstances to find a new nursery and gave notice to the old nursery. We also asked the owner to refund the fees paid for March after the closure.
We received no confirmation that the notice had been received, nor that fees would be refunded. We've emailed twice since, during which time we received another email to say the nursery was still remaining closed until August at the earliest.
So AIBU to be extremely annoyed at the total lack of communication from the owner of the nursery and to expect a refund of the fees paid for March when nursery was closed?

Anyone?!

I think YABU sorry. I paid up until the end of March too despite DS not being there for half of it. Wouldn't have considered not paying really. There are people out there who had to keep paying nursery even when they were closed.

How much are the fees for March, pressure it’s a week from 23rd when everything closed?
If all staff are on furlough it’s very possible the email is not being manned or the person doing it is completely overwhelmed by emails. ( As you’ve left they’ll want to deal with all returning customers first, I’m afraid you’ll probably be at the bottom of their list as you won’t be paying them any more money)

I dont think the nursery have to refund you money for March. Its not their fault you couldn't bring your DC in, which I imagine your contract reflects.

£250 ish. We've moved our DD to a nursery that is going to cost us more because there's not much choice around and my salary has been subject to a salary reduction, so the money would be helpful.
The first 2 emails that went completely unanswered were before they knew our DD wasn't going back. It's a very small nursery (20 or so on the roll) so I highly doubt he's snowed under with emails.
We also asked the manager to pass on our messages, which she did, but said that the owner is hard work and that's just the way he is.
For further context, the only communication he'd had with the staff were the "global emails" he'd sent to parents to inform us that the nursery would not be opening for that month.

How much of March are we talking about? Schools didn't shut till the 20th. They will still have had to pay salaries for that month. If you haven't had to pay from April onward, you've probably done better than a lot of folk who've been paying that whole time. I know it's still money you've not got but I would let that go tbh. Lots of businesses have had a bad time with Covid. The owner or someone in their family could have had it in the period when you emailed.

Yes that's fair enough. In the 4 months she was off I think it would have been polite for him to respond to one of our emails though, especially to accept our notice.

Their communication has been atrocious and YANBU to be annoyed and to remove your DC to another nursery.

I think you are very unrealistic to expect a refund on the March money and I’d let it go, and save yourself any further stress. Many nurseries charged part or full fees throughout lockdown so you probably got off lightly.

Yes, we probably will let it go. I think it's just my annoyance at the lack of communication over the 4 months that has made me even think about a refund. If they'd responded to the initial emails and then we'd received the email to say it wasn't opening, then we would probably have still been pushed to look for somewhere new but not even thought about the money for March.

I own and manage a nursery, and there would be uproar if I had treated the parents as you have been.
For context, we remained open for keyworker children throughout, and the rest of the children were able to return as per Boris’ announcement. We asked parents to decide if their child would return by the middle of the month before they returned (eg let us know by 15th May for a June 1st start) in order to allow us to calculate how many staff to unfurlough. 20% of fees requested (and all children put on term time only contracts if they were not attending) IF parents had not been financially impacted by the virus. Children can not return at all, return part time, or return full time. From Sept, usual contracted hours will apply. No proof requested if they couldn’t pay. We were unable to offer refunds for the final week of March (70 on role, one request for this), but we have communicated on a daily basis about what is happening.

The staff have been treated terribly too, which I think is appalling!

I agree with everyone else.

YABU to expect a refund for the end of March.
However, YANBU to expect replies to e-mails - even if he only checked in every 3 or 4 days. As you've said, there weren't going to be many people contacting him.

You’d usually have to pay during your notice period anyway so see the end of March fees as part of that. March is unlikely to be refunded as they would have already paid outgoings for that month.

I paid for both before and after school club and nursery til the end of March. It wouldn’t even occur to me to ask for my money back.

The poor comms is a different problem though.

Our nursery is the same. Never reply to email and really bad communication. How they run a business I dont know as its very annoying!

If there were only 20 on roll it could well be that they won't reopen. Fair few businesses around my neck of the woods were the owners have spent lockdown reflecting on how much hard work vs. Very little profit is actually worth doing. It's hard to make a nursery business work and with only 20 kids I would struggle to see it as viable. It could be that they haven't got the funds in the bank to refund.

We emailed the nursery to ask if they had any plans for when nursery reopened after losing such a key member of staff I’m not sure why you emailed that tbh, their plan would clearly be to replace that member of staff. People quit jobs all the time. I’m not surprised they didn’t respond.

RunningFromInsanity

We emailed the nursery to ask if they had any plans for when nursery reopened after losing such a key member of staff I’m not sure why you emailed that tbh, their plan would clearly be to replace that member of staff. People quit jobs all the time. I’m not surprised they didn’t respond.

^ exactly this. What response did you expect to that question

😂 Maybe a plan for who would be her 5th keyworker. I'm sorry, but no response to any emails during a time like this, when they specifically said that the email address would be used to respond to parents' queries and concerns, is not good enough.
Emailing parents and staff with a global email a couple of days before the start of the next month to say they would still not be opening that month, is not good enough and not how you treat paying customers or members of your own staff.

@Charleyhorses

If there were only 20 on roll it could well be that they won't reopen. Fair few businesses around my neck of the woods were the owners have spent lockdown reflecting on how much hard work vs. Very little profit is actually worth doing. It's hard to make a nursery business work and with only 20 kids I would struggle to see it as viable. It could be that they haven't got the funds in the bank to refund.

We suspect this and we suspect that the owner knew this as soon as the nursery closed. Seems quite fraudulent to keep pulling in the funding for the free hours and making use of the furlough scheme for so long if that's the case.

I think you have done the best thing by far and will avoid the Sept scrabble for a nursery place as prob a fair few won't reopen. I think, frustrating as it is, you need to write off those fees and move on.

It isn’t fraudulent- all nurseries have been expected to use the funding to pay staff rather than the furlough scheme. They can only use the furlough scheme for the percentage of private fees that they would get above the funding. So a nursery who only gets paid from funded children would use 100% of the funding to pay staff. They haven’t been able to furlough and keep the funding money for themselves.

I would say that using the furlough scheme for months on end, when the owner was fully aware in May that the nursery was not going to reopen, is fraudulent. The furlough scheme is there to try to avoid redundancies, not to pay people for a couple of months when there's no chance of the business reopening.

Sorry that should have said "aware in March", not May.