Any ideas how we can solve 1 afternoon per week childcare headache?

[ChildCareMyProblemAgain]

ExH uses after school club 1 afternoon a week, picks DD (Year 5, aged 10) up from there then has her overnight. He finishes work at 5pm so usually picks up around 5.20/5.30pm.

From September school are reducing wraparounds hours from 5.30pm finish to a 4.45pm for juniors (Years 3-6) finish due to lack of demand. According to ExH DD is often the only child there when he goes to pick up which is obviously costing the school money to keep lights on, heating etc as well as two staff to stay with DD. They are staying open until 5pm for Infants (Years R-2) and juniors who have a younger sibling already at the Wraparound.

ExH lives 30 minutes’ drive from DDs school (so way to far for buses/walking) and DD has some slight learning difficulties and medical issues which means she’s not able to get the bus by herself to ExHs house and if she missed the bus she wouldn’t know what to do.

I work in the office on the days ExH has DD overnight which is over an hour away – the other days I can wfh but it was set as my office days deliberately due to ExHs arrangement – so I can’t help and ExH has said his work rejected have rejected for him to finish in time to pick up DD from wraparound.

School will not allow anyone under the age of 18 to pick up, and won’t allow DD to leave on her own (Can leave alone from after easter of Year 5 if all PR holders and the school agree the child is sensible enough, they do not think DD is sensible enough yet which I agree with)

I know it’s not technically my problem but ExH will make it my problem, so how can we solve this which doesn’t involve me giving up my job (which was his solution last time there was a childcare issue on his day, he just didn’t sort it and I was expected to)?

For context this is the only day DD has any kind of wraparound care, the other days I wfh so she has activities and things she goes to, I however do pay for the wraparound as ExH says thats what CM is for and also it's my choice to send her so I can work 🙄

@Willyoujustbequiet But he will tell her it was me, and she will believe him. To him it's all about control and keeping me in my place.

Exactly. It's just a continuation of abuse essentially. I get it, I really do. I've been there ...7 years in court and a restraining order/perpetrators course.

But there comes a point where you have to take a stand. These men never change. You can't control their actions, you can only control your own.

If your best friend was being taken for a mug I'm sure you'd be outraged on her behalf. She wouldn't deserve it. But its ok for your daughter to be treated with such little respect by someone who is so vindictive that he would drop out of her life to spite you rather than make a few phone calls to sort out childcare? I know that sounds harsh but if you don't set a boundary you will be making a rod for your own back for years to come. You need to advocate for her. You will regret it if you don't

Good luck OP.

Has he really spoken to his employer? I just can't imagine them not being able to come to an arrangement about this!

@WorkCleanRepeat I assume not, he was the same when we were together wouldn't do nursery pick up due to work.

People asking what he does that he can just quit and restart whenever, low level retail or similar sorts of work in chain fast food resturants etc where jobs are 10 a penny and you can quit one day to walk into another the next.,

Can't you turn it back on him and tell him if he wasn't working you wouldn't need childcare either?

Does she have to go to after-school club? Does she have a friend whose mum would be willing to pick her up at the same time as her friend and take her home with them for the couple of hours? When I was having problems getting after-school care for my youngest DS two nights a week, before after-school clubs existed, that's what we did. Friend's mum had him for a couple of hours on those two days and I paid her a small amount for it.

He sounds hard work OP.

The school should have him as an emergency contact as well though. I don’t understand why they won’t take his number - usually you can just write emergency contact details on any forms that come home from school. They often even ask for a second number, so it seems very odd.

Local childminder or informal weekly arrangement where she goes home straight from school with a friend. Might be an easier ask if he will pick her up for dinner, or you can offer a reciprocal weekly arrangement or offer some other type of support that would be useful to them. He would need to be reliable to collect DD on time.

DD might adore him but why are you facilitating her relationship with such a Disney Dad?

You're showing her that men still don't need to figure out their own stuff, females will sort it for them.

You have time to sort it now before September so bio it in the bud quickly.

Tell ex the after school club is finishing so he needs to confirm with you by x date what the plan is or you will presume he doesn't want to see DD anymore on his pick up day. Tell him 'if you haven't replied by the above date I will be arranging my own care and speaking to cms about the extra days payments required

Let him sort and pay for his day. If he doesn't then you sort and pay and amend the info with cms.

get fresh forms to complete from school and put both parents details on. It's bollocks 'oh so if it's an emergency we will look on the system and see you handed the form in not ex so we won't ring him, child will just sit there' Clearly they wouldn't do that !

I would be questioning the school's policy of not accepting your ex's phone number from anyone but him.

Did your neighbour have to give their permission to be added as an emergency contact?

I would be raising it as a possible safeguarding issue - what if you or your neighbour weren't available, and your DC had an accident, or your ex didn't show up after school. The school would need to contact social services eventually for the latter, and would look pretty stupid if, when pressed, they had to admit that they had refused to accept the other parent's phone number. Have you spoken to the head? Read the policy? Governors?

I've worked in schools for 15 years and find this preposterous that they would take a neighbour's number but not their dad's.

Your exH’s logic has no logic to it.

The school need to deal with him on the dates he is responsible for your DD & if for some unknown reason they won’t accept his contact details from you (even though they will accept every other single piece of information about her from you) then they need to get it from him when he collects her from after school.

on the dates he is responsible for his child, he is responsible because he is her father, it’s got nothing to do with where, how or when you work.

if he really would give up the day why not let him & then get the additional CM? Then you could scrap the cost of after school & use the money saved along with the extra cm to pay for a childminder when you need it.

sorry op, it sounds like a rubbish situation & he sounds horrid.

Reduce hours, swap days? It just goes with the territory that there is less and less childcare for older children esp those with SN. I never found anyone to take my DC at all. It's shit. You/Ex need to make work arrangements around it also planning forward esp if you don't think she is able to go to/fro school herself. High school is a year away and then there will be absolutely nothing.

In my world that would be something covered by a little reciprocal slack taking up. It's only a couple of hours at most.

I had this problem for a while and I enlisted a friend's student daughter to pick up my girls from the after-school club, bring them home and stay with them at home for about half hour before I got home . Paid her about £10 for the hour (this was 10 years ago though) and it worked really well.

I'd ask the class WhatsApp if someone can accept payment to have her once a week for that term

Registered Childminder pick her up after sch and your Ex picks her up from there.
👍

Doesn't need to be a registered childminder for a child that age.

Ask around to see if there is a local babysitter or someone to walk her back?
Or find a child minder?
Or very possibly ask your work for some help/ flexibility until she sold enough to walk back?
Your ex sounds like a total arse I'm glad he is your ex!

It’s all very well posters saying the ex should do this or that, if he point blank refuses op is still stuck.
Only solution I can think of is getting her to go home with a mate for a while and collect from there. Although not ideal , mate could be off one day, I don’t know what else to suggest.
In time your dd will realise he’s a cunt though btw. So it’s really going to be his loss eventually.

This.

It's court ordered.

If he is not giving them his contact details I argue he's in breach of his court order.

I would say that you are removing your contact details from the school and no longer consent to them holding your details in writing.

See how they react to that.

Seriously make it their problem.

It's a safeguarding issue. He's failing to safeguard her. They are failing to safeguard her.

Go to court over it if necessary.

Put this in writing to the school and include his number.

Do not pick up the phone on his days. School then have to deal with it as a safeguarding issue. You have informed them of his number.

If they refer to social services it's school, the court and social services fault. He can blame you all he likes. He can withdraw two nights a week.

It's time your daughter saw daddy for who he is rather than you being a doormat to spare her feelings because he is only going to let her down at a later point anyway. Get It over and done with.

Also this.

Remember ultimately your daughter will be expecting her father to turn up. When he turns up late they will kick off at him.

If he does it repeatedly, school will try and contact you. Make it clear you will not deal with them on that day. Again it'll be him who has to deal with them on the day at pick up.

Point out to the school they are failing to safeguard your daughter and they need to take up the issue over contact details with him if he fails to collect because as they point out, you are not allowed to.

Let your daughter see her daddy doesn't care enough to pick her up on time. Let your daughter see that he isn't prepared to facilitate that day. Keep repeating it's up to daddy.

Honestly otherwise you are setting her up for a bigger fall later on. Stop enabling him.

If this is court ordered contact I’d raise the school’s refusal to take his number with the Governors. Sounds like someone in the office has got it wrong.