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?

Better to terminate before the child has started and got settled/ emotionally attached rather than a few months in.

£10 per day for late payment is also v heavy handed!!

You didn’t NEED reminding OP, you didn’t forget. You just chose not to pay.

YABU. I would have done the same.

It’s the terms! My nursery charges £10 a day plus £30 administration fee for late payments, also terminates contracts at five days. It’s a business; the childminder can be as heavy-handed as she likes.

I’d imagine to discourage people from taking the piss.

Wow. None of my childcare providers have specified anything like those kinds of terms.

This again is the same for my children's school and the after school club they run. Clearly too many people have pushed their luck, it costs extra keeping staff on so they need to charge this to prevent it happening.

It's a priority now!

Private businesses can charge whatever they like for their services. If people think it’s heavy handed then they can choose not to sign up for it. However the person who started the thread was given a written contract with all the terms and conditions, decided to go ahead, signed up, and now shouldn’t be surprised at the situation she finds herself in.

When I worked as a childminder I finished at 6.30pm. People would turn up late several days every week…..6.40/6.45/sometimes close to 7. Always with an excuse as to why they were late. I introduced a late pick up fee of £1 for every minute people were late to collect their children. Guess what….everyone miraculously found the ability to pick their children on time every day!

You say heavy handed. I say childminder that has obviously had too many people take the piss out of her before and has decided to put her foot down.

Find another childminder

Because that's the date the invoice says payment is due by??

How unusual. None of them have ever had any terms like that?

it just hasn't been priority.

This comes across as so entitled OP. What happens the next time you deem something else to take priority

She is running a business not a charity and it's really not unusual to have to pay a month in advance for services like this

Yes sorry, there were terms for late payment, but I meant nothing like 10£ a day +£30 admin fee . The last nursery I used it was 50£ administration fee after 2 weeks - that was it.
Not even sure if the preschool has one. Will double check the new childminder now 😳

Why should she have to remind you?
She's running a business, not a charity.

I can't understand why you didn't just pay her on time, but would look for another childminder.

Which probably has the desired outcome of people paying ontime....

A nursery has 30+ children attending so if one person is a bit late paying then it’s not a big deal to them financially - they can still cover all their outgoings and pay all their staff.

A childminder will usually only have a handful of families, so if one person doesn’t pay them it’s sometimes 20-25% of their monthly income…… which could mean they can’t pay their mortgage or feed their kids. Hence the need for stricter rules around late/non payment.

Just hold your hands up, apologise and ask them to reconsider. Drama over.

Woah.

You lost me at 'stupid FTM'.

A childminder typically has 3 to 5 customers they don't change for years....some 11 or more years. But funding means new customers as young as 9 months get at least 15 hours and up to 30 hours paid at the lower funding rate set by the government system....some rates are £2 or more less than the normal charged rate. So that's pay cut one and often paid in arrears by as much as 3 months....in which time the children still eat, do crafts and activities. So parents doing 30 to 40 hours have massive savings ....many still only do 3 days. If third 3 full time parents then pay late there is no money to buy food or activities for the minded the children and no money to live on pay mortgages, council tax etc......if you as a business have numerous ever changing customers you can charge a rate not set by anyone else and are unlikely to have such a high percentage of those customers paying nothing for a few days and sometimes weeks every month.....so who do you pick given the chance the pay on time customers or the can't be bothered ones.
This is why all childcare settings are closing their doors faster than ever before.
My husband is also self employed it's totally different to being a childcare setting nowadays where most of your work is paid at a rate determined by the government.....we are no longer really self employed as we have little say even on the rate we charge.

Definitely Christmas, birthdays, holidays, hair, nails etc are all more important to these late payers.

This is one of the many reasons I stopped childminding, parents thinking it's ok to pay late/when they can be bothered. I too had late fees and no more childcare was offered until full payment and late fees had been paid and was in my account. I only ever terminated 2 contacts and both were to families who did not pay on time repeatedly. One mum had a different excuse every month and would even laugh about it. She was not laughing when she lost her childcare despite me warning her the month before if she is late paying again I will terminate the contract. She was the reason I introduced late payment fees.

Yes I should have paid it but the Christmas period is expensive and we've had lots on and it just hasn't been priority.

OMG, do you not realise how entitled and dickish that sounds @hoolahoolay ? Your DC's care is "not a priority"? Your difficulties in finding childcare are a suitable punishment, I think.

I work in the public sector, but even I know how important it is to pay the self-employed & small traders on the nail. They rely on the income, and I know what tiny margins most self-employed people survive on.

The childminder has had a lucky escape.

And if the parent decides not to send their child at the last minute the childminder is left last minute with no income for that month and having to find and settle in another child.
Where is two weeks from? It was due on the 1st today is the 6th and the child is supposed to be doing settling.