Noone picked up my daughter and school didn't ring.

[Cantheowneroftheredcorsapleasemovetheircar]

On Thursday my daughter was supposed to be picked up by my sister as my husband and I were both working. She finishes school at 3:20pm, she's 7 and is in year 3.

At 4pm I was on my break at work and called sister to ask how DD is.

Sister bloody FOROGT to pick her up and wasn't even in our home town. She was about an hour's drive away at her new boyfriends house.

In a panic I hung up on spluttering apologising sister and immediately rang school to find out what happened to DD. They just casually said "yeah, we've got her, she's in after school club"

At the time I was too busy arranging for someone else to pick up her with only 10 minutes left of my break and relieved she was safe to think much more on the fact that the scholl hadnt informed me so I just said thank you to the school and said someone would be there soon.

Would you complain to the school or at least mention it that noone rang me or DH to say she hadn't been picked up? If I hadn't rung sister I wouldn't have known, and what would have happened when noone arrived at 5pm when it closes?

They also charged me and I could have avoided this charge or at least got a lower charge if I'd got her picked up by 4pm.

Another fucking insane Mumsnet thread with people who live in theory land and don't bother to read.

This.

YOU and your sister let her down, not the school. Arrange proper childcare if you can’t collect your child from school.

I don't understand you. The school I work in has a secretary. The child will be given to us in ASC if we have a space. The secretary will make a quick phone call to parent. 9 times out of ten They are just running late and are driving. The secretary is employed until half three.school is fi ished at 3.10. In our schools, policies children under a certain age are not allowed to walk home themselves and must be handed over to an adult or the ASC. If no one is there for them parent is to be contacted no later then 3.20. If parent A fails to answer they call parent B. Then emergency contact 1 and 2.

This isn't what happens here. The parent is always called with an uncollected child or of there's uncertainty.

What difference would it have made if they’d called you? You’d still have been late anyway. I would appreciate what they did.
I’m sorry you were let down by your sister but YABU.

Sorry, don't know what SBM and DSL are. Is your only task phone calls to irresponsible parents? Do you then tell management that you had to call the parents as they hadn't contacted the school?

DSL is deputy safeguarding lead and I very impressed a school can guarantee one will be free exactly 10 minutes after school finishes every day to make phone calls!

I think the op wants to complain that the school didn’t inform her that her chikd had not been collected and was in AS club. I’d be worried too, and frustrated at lack of comms,

School Business Manager and Designated Safeguarding Lead. A huge part of my job is calling parents for a huge variety of stuff.

Child not turned up? Call parents
Odd looking bruise on child? Call parent
Child says uncle Barry gave them a special hug? Call parents
No swimming kit? Call parents
Child feeling poorly? Call parents
Dinner money in arrears? Call parents
Refusing medication? Call parents
Child suspense? Call parent

99% of the time, it's an innocent mistake. Mam thought dad had reported child absent, the bruise was from a swing, uncle Barry did a spinny hug which child called special, dad thought mam had topped up dinner money, swimming kit hung on wrong peg, etc etc etc

So not, not my only job, but a huge amount of my time is spend on the phone to parents yes.

You know, along side paying all the bill, monitoring budgets, arrange trips, dealing with HR queries, making referrals, CTF requests, writing forecasts, job descriptions, policies etc etc etc.... but the number 1 priority every time is the child

Maybe chat gp your schools protocol. I just did it for mine as was curious what would happen

In our school parents would have been called in 15m so 330 as school finishes 315

child will go to the office - be given a lollipop and parents called

school gates are shut then so to collect if late parents have to go to the office

I'd expect a call from school at hometime in this situation, but my child has never been in wraparound care and always gone home at 3.15

Since op has previously used the afterschool club for her daughter, I think it's more understandable to recognise the daughter as a child that sometimes goes to afterschool club, and not call op immediately. School may have thought op forgot to book on this day, or even that there was an admin error.

I wouldn't complain but I would calmly explain the whole experience, and it may cause school to review what they do in these situations. Don't frame it as a complaint though.

This has been shared on Mumsnets Facebook page FYI!

Exactly - it amazes me that people think that schools run like well oiled machines with plenty of resource available to deal with the unexpected as soon as it arises. It also amazes me the faith people have in the power of the 'policy' - that is to say that if something is written down in a policy document then that's akin to it having being brought down from Mt Sinai on tablets of stone. Should the school have called the OP sooner? Quite possibly. Would it be reasonable for the OP to complain? No. I'd be keeping my head very much down.

It's maybe worth checking with the school that they have correct contact details for you and others in case they're out of date.

I suspect they have a list of parents to phone and get a member of the after school club staff to make all the calls after they've settled the children with an activity and waited a bit for everyone who's 10-20 mins late stuck in traffic etc so they're not making unnecessary calls.

I’d imagine they just took her there without a big fuss to ensure she didn’t worry. Or they assumed she was booked in if she is sometimes. I am sure when no one then turned up later they would have called you. No biggie paying for it surely?! It’s your sisters fault not theirs

My mum was late to pick DS up once and he was taken to after school club. I had no phone call, only a text message the next day about the charge, which is how I found out!

I think as my DS used after school club very often they just assumed I'd forgotten to book, which may have been what happened with your DD, especially if it's a day that she usually goes to after school club?

Wow!
At DC school, they would know who was picking up the child (in this case Dsis), they don't release children to just anyone, and wouldn't assume she was booked into ASC.

If no one picks up child, they are sent to ASC and the parent is called. Certainly before 4 pm.
It seems now that parents are meant to be grateful that schools even exist and should be delighted they have any kind of teaching experience.

Of course, Dsis is at fault here but it's downright weird that so many on here would not expect a school to call them 40 mins after the day ended. Do they really want to wait til ASC is ending before they check which kids they are meant to have?

I think the school should have called you, my sons school have called me when I thought I’d booked him in asc but hadn’t. If you hadn’t booked afterschool club then surely they would be concerned that either someone had forgotten or something had happened to whoever was supposed to collect her, so who would be coming at the end of afterschool club? I would raise it with them, not as a complaint but just to clarify their procedures and raise your concern.

I don't think you should be complaining about the cost when they looked after your child after no one collected them but it's not unreasonable to expect them to call if no one has come to collect. On the other hand it's very irresponsible of your sister to forget so I'd rethink asking her to do that again.

If only. I didn't say it wasn't annoying (to put it mildly) but it is priority.

So many people have.

And I do.

My earlier reply was framed by the headline ‘no one picked up my DD’. The issue there is with the sister’s failure to turn up.

Had it been - ‘school did not contact me when no one picked up by DD’ I would have agreed that the school ought to have contacted you - email/phone/text - to advise that your DD had not been collected and that she had been placed in ASC, with pick up time stated (and fee).

I agree, they should have called to ascertain that there was no issue, but it may also be a bit of confusion as DD may not have remembered or expressed her concern at not being collected by her aunt. I’d drop a polite message to the school enquiring what their protocol was and explaining that had you not called the nominated collector you would not have known and been able to make arrangements - and DD would have remained uncollected at the end of ASC. They should have a protocol as, obviously, a nominated adult may have been in an accident or taken ill etc and they would not have known until 6pm when no-one arrived.

Well clear the balance then!

No you can’t complain to school. I think that you should find out school policy. If their policy is normally to call and they didn’t, you can mention that you’re sorry and that you’d just assumed she’d been picked up as you didn’t get a phone call, if it happens again, they should let you know, but you’re not expecting it to happen again. End of.
at the end of the day, your child was forgotten - not their fault,
and placed in asc - a wise decision on their part.

The school I worked at would keep hold of a child for 10 minutes after the school day in the classroom and then take the child to after school club whilst the office tried to make contact with the parents.
Usually it was a case of a parent forgetting they hadn’t booked them into the after school club or being stuck in traffic etc
it was the the protocol of the school to make that phone call after the 10 minutes to check that everyone was ok.
If the parents were able to get there and collect by 3.45 (school day finished at 3.10) then they were not charged for the session, otherwise they were charged the full rate.