Childminder terminating contract

[hoolahoolay]

Surely I'm not being unreasonable. So my son is due to start with a childminder next week when I go back to work after maternity leave. We have settling in sessions this week

So she sent the invoice for January out early December and she said to let her know if there were any errors, the due date on the invoice was 1st January. For one reason or another we haven't paid it and instead of reminding us she has messaged this morning to say she's terminated contract as invoice is 5 days late.
Surely she could have sent a payment reminder.

WTF can I do now?

I imagine that her services are in demand and she can pick and choose who she takes on, and therefore she can take on clients that adhere to her requirements. My friend was moaning the other day around this as her cleaner has 'fired' her as she was late in paying. I think it's really disrespectful. The most you can do is massively fall on your sword, apologise profusely, and confirm it will never happen again. Or find a new childminder and pay this time. Apart from its the respectful thing to do, I have always paid childminders, dog walkers, cleaners on time with no reminders. We live in an area where they are all a premium so if you mess about, you lose. Anyway, it's the right thing to do. Apologise and hope for the best!

OP How would you feel if you weren’t paid on time ‘for one reason or another’? I’ve been self-employed for twenty-five years now and absolutely can’t be bothered with late payers either. I would probably have sent out a polite reminder but I’ve also developed a keen instinct about potential clients so maybe would be happy to ‘let you go’ if alarm bells were already ringing. The last thing any small business needs is the hassle of chasing up someone who potentially could be a regular problem.

OP asked a question, has received 28 pages of answers, yet didn't have the grace to come back and acknowledge.
Maybe she is too busy looking for a new childminder.🙄

Maybe Marcus should have kept his dinky in his trousers...we all know how incredibly strick the rules are in Dubai and unlike Britain the laws the law, no messing.

But that's for a different thread.

To be fair, that would be a better use of her time

Paying them too hopefully.

Go to the supermarket and tell them you'll 'pay them at some point'. See how far you get

YABVVU and you know it

You've had your arse handed to you, deservedly so

Maybe she just doesn’t realise good childcare is extremely scarce. Here we’d pay the nursery bill over the mortgage!

I think this is it actually! Instead of contacting the CM to apologise and try resolve it, OP has come onto MN looking for validation. The tone in the OP posts tells me a lot.

I imagine the CM has seen a few things that gave her cause for concern, so this is the cherry on top of the shitty behaviour pie - CM did what she could do to avoid having to deal with this behaviour for many months to come.

@wombat15 oh I wouldn't have let her start at all without paying - but I do think a quick call or text first stating payment is due before starting or she can't start would be more sensible- especially at this time of year as peoples memory's can often be up their arse with too much going on -

It was made quite clear way back. The fact that you keep arguing about it is your choice.

She sent out the invoice in early December.
It takes about 2 minutes to set up a payment (scheduled for the future if necessary). If she'd done it then, she wouldn't have forgotten it.

OP hasn't said she forgot anyway. She said they didn't pay "for one reason or another". Which I take to mean, they were hoping to leave it as long as possible before paying, possibly because they didn't have the money.

If OP had genuinely forgotten her first response to getting the message would be to think "oh shit" and to ring the childminder and grovel. Not to post on MN.

I disagree. If OP didn't manage to make even the first payment without a reminder there's a good chance she would miss others and then the childminder would have to keep on reminding. It demonstrates a complete lack of care and organisation and if there are plenty of people wanting childcare why risk dealing with an unreliable parent.

There is no requirement to remember anything. You just set up a payment as soon as you get to the bill.

Like someone else said, the invoice was the reminder. The OP will have known the fees and the payment terms before this.

Because the poor people like me are on a tight budget so we like to get essential bills paid immediately to get them out the way, whereas some rich people are too "busy" and "important" and don't understand what it's like to be missing money so they see no problem in other people missing their money.

Surely I'm not being unreasonable

well I would say you are. What can you do? Apologise and see if she will back down. She probably won’t. She’ll be thinking if you’re this bad at the start why risk you continuing to be this bad. Most good CMs have a waiting list. You’ll most likely have to find a new one, or not go back to work. Maybe try nurseries too.

Has @hoolahoolay been back?

Nope, maybe she needed a reminder? 😂

@WoolySnail 😂

I'm still puzzled why the OP took to MN rather than do a Game of Thrones penance walk to the CM's house with 6 months in advance in cash. It would have seemed a more sensible option.

Strange.

I used to be a registered childminder and had one entitled rich parent who was terrible about paying. Once you have experienced that, you are super-sensitive to it happening again. Late payers often went hand-in-hand with late timekeeping which was another nightmare. It was so disrespectful

Our cleaner sends a monthly invoice, and a firm note on the bottom of it that late payment will mean cancellation of the contract. She apologised for the wording when she sent the 1st one but said she'd allowed a family to run up 3 months unpaid and never got a penny of it. I pay her the minute I get the invoice so I don't forget (I have a brain like a sieve).

I would eat humble pie here, OP, apologise profusely and offer 3 months pay in advance to be repeated so she knows that it was an error that won't be repeated. We all make mistakes at the end of the day.

Or maybe just calling the CM to apologise and offering to pay immediately plus a late penalty....

I hope the childminder is reading this, and I hope she was warned local childminders

It's your first invoice and you didn't pay it on time.

Maybe it was an oversight but make sure you pay on time with your next childminder, they are trying to earn a living too.