Nursery closing early Xmas eve and still paying

[purplehairrinse]

Aibu for being annoyed they are charging the whole day but we have to collect before 12?

I very much doubt the terms say "we can decide to close whenever we like just because we fancy it, and still charge you for it"! And if the terms do say that, then they would be unreasonable terms indeed. Let's stop thinking about childcare and imagine any other service. In what other industry would it be acceptable to charge someone for a service and then just decide you don't want to provide it, but they still have to pay?

No they wont

Theyll say something about how staff holidays are covered and how that impacts what parents owe.

I presume all those people objecting to this get paid for their own holidays, right?

So how do you think the nursery ensures the same for their staff?

Wow that’s a bit dramatic !

Our nursery have been trying to discourage people from sending kids in on Christmas Eve. I get it, they want to give their staff the day off, but they’re still expecting parents to pay and meanwhile some of us still have to work until 5! I’ve been asked if I can collect earlier…. No I have a job to do, and I’m paying you until 6pm.

No. I’m self-employed so don’t get paid for any of my time off - I factor it into my regular rates instead, which is what the nursery should do.

No. I'm not suggesting that 🫠

That would be another way of doing it, yes. But it would all work out the same, overall, in the end. If the OP would prefer that, she can look for a nursery that does it that way.

Tell you what @purplehairrinse
withdraw your child from this nursery

I have a strong sense that the nursery staff won’t miss you

Ours does this and I resent it. “We were hoping to let the staff go home early on Christmas Eve, so please let us know what time you’ll be collecting” on a group messaging platform, with the implication that you are a heartless POS if you need anything like a full day of care. We don’t celebrate Christmas. My children’s carers are Muslim and Orthodox, so I doubt they are rushing home to baste a turkey either.

its that fact they bill you for something that there not providing

as for them not bothered it’s always and good if you’ve child care but some people it’s a double whammy
your paying for nothing and you still have to work and it’s dropped you well in the shit for child care

But it isn’t a holiday.

I am actually very much in favour of giving staff time off as a goodwill gesture. But that shouldn’t happen at the expense of paying customers.

For example, at my nursery parents have been asked to email if their child is attending on Christmas Eve. They are anticipating that numbers will be low and therefore can adjust their staffing accordingly. That’s good. What isn’t good is unilaterally deciding they are shutting, parents will pay and tough luck if you object because you signed a contract.

I mean, does it really take much imagination to realise that if you and your partner work in Sainsbury’s or for the emergency department at the local hospital or for the police that you might already have struggled with the time off for Christmas and so announcing you need to take Christmas Eve off would go down like the proverbial lead balloon?

More to the point, would any of the people sorrowfully and self righteously shaking their heads about selfish parents making nurseries work Christmas Eve be happy with their health or their safety compromised because of minimal staffing? I suspect we wouldn’t. I also suspect those most upset about poor workers rights in this context don’t give a shit about workers rights when they realise they have run out of milk on Christmas Eve and are happy to nip to the Tesco express then.

MN is strange on this topic. The attitude is always the belligerent view that if you use a nursery then you should put up with whatever they offer because you are actually a heartless human in the first place with no morals or you wouldn’t use one. (Rather than it being a perfectly normal thing most kids use in some form or another!)

The nursery has clearly decided it is a half day holiday for staff.

And they can either fund it like this or up fees across the board.

They don’t get to decide that @TheKeatingFive , not in this context.

Yes, most nurseries do close for a week between Christmas and new year, but that’s different to a sudden closure. It isn’t legal, no matter how much people throw their weight around. No more legal than paying for any service and it not being provided.

Once you have accepted money for something you cannot just announce that that thing is not happening. You can issue a refund or you can offer the service, but not be paid and accept the money.

I guess it depends how the invoicing works - are you sure you’re being charged a full rate? My nursery closed for two weeks at Christmas - our bill was the same but that’s because it was calculated yearly (so 50 weeks / 12) so they could pay their staff all year. It was all in the contract.

Yes they do if it's been agreed in contract

Agree,the parents that pick up at the last minute 6pm are the ones who don’t work,funding used to be term time only,now it can be split to use all year,we close on the 23rd at 6pm until the 5th jan

No, they don’t. The contract can say whatever they like; it doesn’t make it legal.

You keep saying this but it’s just not true - contracts have to be legal. You can’t just write whatever you like in them and expect it to be okay.

There would be nothing illegal in this, they can structure payments how they like.

Yes, but they can’t demand payment for a service they’re refusing to offer.

This isn’t them closing for bank holidays, or training - Christmas Eve is a normal working day. If they want to do something nice for their staff and close early that’s fine but they have to fund it, not force parents to cover that.

Our nursery closed two weeks a year, but our monthly bill was the same for the months these weeks fell on They have to cover holidays somehow and this was all laid out in the contract, which we all signed up to.

You’ve posted a lot in this thread and we aren’t going to agree. It’s one thing to have pre agreed days the nursery is closed which parents who send the children on those days pay for: I don’t like this, but then you could say I am biased as my DD attends Mondays and Fridays. A couple of my friends have argued this with nurseries and ‘won’; they have got their children in for a different day. I haven’t bothered but it does grate that I have to pay for at least five days my daughter doesn’t attend whereas this wouldn’t be the case if she attended Tuesdays and Thursdays. But it is at least known about in advance. Sudden closures are completely different and again, it’s different when it’s a last minute emergency but just ‘we feel like finishing early’ doesn’t fall into that category.

If if was up to me everyone would finish early on Christmas Eve. But it is not up to me. Contracts do not supersede the law .

If the OP checks her contract, I'm sure she will be able to see exactly what she's agreed to with regards to these kind of discretionary closures.