To refuse to pay nursery notice period fee in these circumstances?

[rsarw]

Posted a week ago about my 12 month old DS' nursery, which we're pulling him out of after a week after seening evidence of substandard care (examples listed below).

Their usual notice period is 2 months, for which we'd be liable for fees, but as we're pulling him out after 1 week becuase we're concerned the care is substandard surely we should only pay for the sessions he's actually had.

Keen to hear thoughts.

Examples of poor care:

babies being left to it/ not picked up or comforted when crying, multiple times - I’ve had to resist the urge to comfort them myself. It’s possible they were eventually picked up after I left but it went on for a good 5 mins and staff seemed to completely ignore it.

Very little staff interaction with babies, staff are rarely on the floor playing or interacting with them. Babies are desperate for attention so swarm me when I come in.

little girl fell off a bike toy badly, hitting her head. Member of staff didn’t know what to do and had to be told by another multiple times to apply a cold compress. She then picked DS up and put him on the same toy
despite the fact he’s not old enough and his key worker had to take him off it.

staff heating milk too hot for babies, and other staff member noticing and reminding them they needed to check it. Baby could presumably have burnt mouth if other staff hadn’t stepped in.

DS incredibly thirsty on return from first proper day, hadn’t had his milk, assuming also hadn’t had water.

staff expressing slight contempt for babies eg X does that for attention, ‘they throw themselves at the floor to getus to come over’

my son’s key worker hardly interacting with him at his settling sessions, not noticing/ leaving him to cry on the floor when upset (when I was there).

communication with me not good, when asking how the day/ session was or calling for an update they will just say ‘he seems ok’ or ‘he’s doing well’, then when I ask if he’s been crying it turns out he has.

staff seem very focussed on completing tasks eg nappies and meals and naps and app updates but not on general engagement with the babies. I get nursery is 3:1 and will inevitably be less attentive but it feels like the staff actively avoid the babies to try and get them to expect less and be more self sufficient.

No snark meant!

And yes agree with your points, as there is no cooling off.

Re. parents, will be letting them know our reasons for leaving.

I totally agree.

You have signed a contract therefore are liable for the fees according to their terms and conditions. I agree with reporting your concerns to Ofsted. But why did you still send your DC when you weren't happy with the settling in sessions. That was the whole point of them to avoid this kind of scenario. Perhaps offer to pay for the rest of the month as a compromise.

You can give notice to your nursery for whatever reasons you like if you're not comfortable with the care, rational or not. In most cases, the least stressful course of action is to give the notice, move your child immediately, pay the two months and draw a line under it. Yes, you can go back and forth with evidence of things you don't like but will it really be worth the stress and effort? People here are already picking holes at you, and they don't have any skin in the game. Chalk it up to experience and move on.

If you got a bad vibe from the settling in session you shouldn't have taken the place and gone for somewhere else.

To be entitled legally to dispense with the notice obligation you will need to show that the nursery had already breached the contract so severely that it was effectively terminated (a term often used is "breakdown of the mutual trust and confidence between the parties"). I dont know if a small claims court judge would find the evidence sufficient to meet that bar but you can certainly seek to rely on it. As a pp said its very unlikely they'd pursue a small claim court action anyway because there is a real risk they'd lose plus negative publicity about the nursery whichever way it goes. (Local papers would quite like this sort of story, particularly if you alerted them to it, which you can also say to the nursery.)

I understand why you don't want to send your child there, it doesn't sound ideal.

However, I don't think ofsted will be that interested in the examples you mentioned. No child was actually harmed or put in likely risk of harm. One staff member made milk too hot; another was monitoring them and fixed the problem before it was given to the baby: that's actually good they have this cross-checking policy. If/when you make this complaint to ofsted, their first question will be "how did the nursery respond when you gave them your concerns". It seems from your op that you haven't, they haven't had a chance to respond. So it's not fair for you to complain to ofsted, or to abscond from the contract (not sure if that's the right word but yswim)

Exactly my thoughts too, why would you do that?

If you signed a contract pre the settling in period then they too must have signed said contract to provide a certain standard of care. I would argue if this ever got to court that they were not providing the standard of care that was stated.

Was the person who made the too hot bottles and the person who had to be asked multiple times to apply a cold compress on to the head of the injured girl the same person or different people?

Could it be just one or two of the nursery staff who aren’t capable or is it all of them?

PathOfLeastResitance · Today 11:52

...if you signed a contract then that may very well be what they have every right to hold you to.

I'm not so sure, because if it's as she's described it, they are in breach of contract, by not providing the necessary standard of care.

I sent a complaint to ofsted about my sons previous nursery. They were not interested in the slightest and actually forwarded the complaint o the nursery manager who then contacted me to complain that new parents would see that I had spoken with ofsted. Ofsted are pretty uselsss in my experience.

My complaint was around my son sustaining 25 physical injuries (being bitten, scratched, hitting his head etc with staff mostly never witnessing what had happened) with 8 of these happening over 8 weeks in a row. I actually bathed my son one night to see a very sore small bite mark on his ribs when staff had told me he’d had a lovely day. I was worried that staff weren’t diligent enough to spot what was happening to my son.

Have a look at your contract and see if it has a cooling off period. I am a childminder and my parents have to pay four weeks notice when deciding to leave however if a parent decided after a week I was not right for them I would expect them to pay for sessions used and they would lose their deposit as this would go towards their four weeks notice.

you signed a contract then that may very well be what they have every right to hold you to.
Surely if they are breaking their side of the contract by not providing safe and appropriate care the OP has the right not the honour it either.
I doubt they would take the issue to the small claims court as if the care is inappropriate will become public knowledge

Have you met with the Nursery Manager to discuss your concerns and the reasons for pulling your child out? If not I would suggest you request a meeting (and take DP with you). They may be prepared to allow a mutual compromise on the basis the nursery clearly wasn't a good fit for your child. Perhaps see if they'll accept 1 months fees? I pulled my DD2 from a nursery many years ago as she had a bruise on her thigh which they tried to underplay and did not want to tell me who had been supervising her (nappy change) at the time. Ultimately they agreed no notice period but that was after a meeting and obviously clear evidence of the bruise.

It's actually reasonably easy for a provider to pursue a smalls claims, the insurer either does all the work on the providers behalf, or pays the provider then pursues the small claim themselves.

However, I've read your previous posts and I think you should be reporting to Ofsted, which I think would be enough to terminate under a breakdown of contract ... go through your contract with a fine tooth comb.

I agree. Unless Ofsted have other reasons to be concerned they aren’t going to investigate a lot of allegations made but the OP. A newspaper isn’t going to print a story either unless the OP can back it up. The OP hasn’t made a complaint.

The suggestion that the OP will get a better outcome if she threatens the nursery is very risky. She will likely get a large bill. This won’t be the nursery’s first experience of a disgruntled parent wanting to pull the child out after a week. Which is why there is a clause to tie people in for at least 2 months.

Write to them listing your observations and concerns and ask for a meeting. See what they offer. They might decide they want to be rid of you.

Basically OP saw a child fall off a bike - regular thing at nursery. (Has that child's mother pulled her son out?). You saw a nursery worker talk to another about the temperature of the milk. That's normal - adjust the temp until it's right - and supervise more junior staff. But you don't know how hot it was and it actually wasn't given to a baby anyway. So what's the complaint?

Your son didn't take his milk one day - quite normal in a new setting for babies to refuse milk/ food.

With a 3:1 ratio they cannot possibly pick up and hold every child who cries - and get food, nappies etc done. I very much doubt you pick your son up and hold him every time and all the time. (And if you did I'm not sure that would be good for him).

By all means raise a complaint. Why not - it's what everyone does when they don't want to pay. By all means tell all the other parents and use your influence that way. But in the end your priority will be DS and finding the best childcare for him.

If you have concerns about the care or safety of children at the nursery then report to the relevant body depending on where you are based. E.g. ofsted or care inspectorate.

Check your contract, there may be a cooling off period where you aren’t liable for the 2 month fees.

To add - pulled DD1 from a nursery as it changed ownership from a lovely family hands on establishment to a company who were buying up lots of nurseries in the area. In first week they cut numbers of staff, changed regimes re food / drink etc and it was just not for us. We left on basis we did not agree with the change and considered our contract effectively terminated. They threatened to sue. We told them to get on with it but expected notfication from them / their solicitors of court dates etc. They obvs sold the 'debt' on as we got letters from debt collectors but nothing ever transpired re taking us to court.

I hope you are going to report to Ofsted!

Your son didn't take his milk one day - quite normal in a new setting for babies to refuse milk/ food.

100% agree with this, it's been an on-off problem with my DD and she's been at her (very good) nursery for nearly 2 years! I always pick her up with a big drink and she's like a thirsty camel at pickup time. She doesn't drink when she's excited/having fun/upset... that's all the time lol

Did the nursery have reviews / or did you know others that went there before starting. I remember asking lots of people, searching for reviews on local Facebook groups etc. And day nurseries.co.uk normally has reviews and a score. It does sound really poor care, just wondering has anyone not flagged it before

The ‘poor’ childcare doesn’t appear to extend to your child so I’m not sure you can use breach of contract as a way of not paying.

Did you put in writing your concerns as soon as you saw them.
These days it’s all about evidence and giving them a chance to change.
If you signed a contract you’d have to pay and then take them to the small claims court but you’d have to prove your concerns.

Maybe just put in writing your concerning observations with as much detail as possible, names of staff if you know them etc. Then state the action you will take, they won’t want that recorded in court so might back down.

I pulled mine from school when he couldn’t have the GCSEs he wanted. We had to pay a full term if we hadn’t given a terms notice. But I had it in writing, beforehand, that this would be forfeited if he couldn’t do what he wanted. They still tried it on though, I just resent all the emails to them.

If what you’ve written is all true then that’s awful, they’ve breached their contract and you certainly should report them to Ofsted.

To the PP who wrote this:

I sent a complaint to ofsted about my sons previous nursery. They were not interested in the slightest and actually forwarded the complaint o the nursery manager who then contacted me to complain that new parents would see that I had spoken with ofsted.

^ this is not how Ofsted work. Ignore, OP and make your complaint via the official process.