Looking after kids. Working from home

[Dressassistance]

Hi 😊 I wfh as do the majority of my team. It seems that after school pick up and during school holidays, some of my colleagues with children are not really available. They take ages to respond, are inactive on teams and don’t answer calls. This of course impacts negatively on other team members. They are not catching up or anything after work, they work their standard hours.

I can’t get my head around this being acceptable when people who work from office / other people working from home (including myself) would have childcare in place and working as normal.
What are other people’s thoughts on this? Am I being harsh?

I am prepared to be roasted but I do this. DS is off this week, he was with me all day Tuesday (other days me or DH are off or he is with grandparents). He is 10 and can do his own thing - he came to speak to me a few times and I took him for a walk on lunch but that was it. A younger child would be unworkable but not older if they can entertain themselves.

I wfh full time in IT, I’ve had loads of meetings this week. It doesn’t affect my job. My manager knows and is happy, a few do it and no one takes the piss.

We also have staff based in India on my team and they do the same hours as us (standard is 8-4 but we have flexibility, you just have to be online 10-12 and 2-4 (they do let me nip out to get DS from school and I do 7-4 on those days. India is ahead of the UK so you can hear their children in the background. No one minds.

I work in a legal role that, if dealt with externally, would cost my entire salary for dealing with one or two incidents a year. We get 12-20 incidents a year, about half of which require prompt attention, and 2-3 tend to need a bit of overtime through the year.

The rest of the time, I provide advice hoc advice, deliver training and awareness, and tweak and refine policy and procedure in line with latest practice and guidance. And support a few income-generating projects too.

The org had massive overspend in my area prior to my introducing up-to-date procedures and technology. They generally more than happy for me to deal with all their issues (which nobody finds interesting but it's imperative for us to comply) for a fraction of the cost.

So yeah, I can largely work when I want.

(Separately it's an org which allows you to flex your hours any time between 7 and 9pm, so long as you make yourself available for any booked meetings. Lots of people out 4-6 but back online at 6)

This really frustrates me - it’s such a careful balancing act with wrap around/clubs/drop offs. A few of my colleagues have been working from home this week with their children. Prehaps I’m a mug!

@Dressassistance wow OP, life is hard enough for working parents! Give people a break.

@rookiemere ‘swapped with any DMs..’

thank god life has moved on. Stop pissing on flexible working. Your experience was wrong. Flexible working is vital for women.

What’s your problem? You’re what I would call a jobsworth. I collect my child and take them to their grandparents house. I use 40 mins of my unpaid lunch break to do it. I use the other 20 to eat. Not that it’s any of your business. Have you thought… maybe your colleagues are doing the same. We don’t have after school clubs in our area since Covid. Back off that high horse..

I always figure that the time spent talking bollocks with the bollocks talker in the office is time I can discount against actually working. So if I take a nap when wfh, it's actually more productive than listening to the office wankers. The big problem is we're still wired up to value presenteeism over value. That's a 19th century approach and fucking insane in this 2026. But yes, it's not okay to pretend you're working with kids running around in the background. See also senior managers who plead school run when their kids are late teens. Absolute piss take.

Others who have arranged childcare are picking up the slack for some who haven’t which also isn’t fair. What you describe is totally fine but that’s not at all what I am describing. I am talking about going quiet for hours on end and still working the same hours as everyone else. I am also a working parent! Im not trying to beat up people who are trying their best in difficult circumstances. I just asked for peoples views on this situation and some help on perspective hopefully some tips on how to navigate the situation.

I wfh with dd1 today, dd2 went to grandparents. Dd1 is 11 and sat next to me building a book nook, then went elsewhere when I had a meeting. They were both at grandparents yesterday as I wanted to spend a full day in the office. I can work with them both now they are older but I don't take the piss. If I have a bust week or something I have to really focus on it's grandparents or holiday club. And I did work 5 full days in the office before covid and this is definitely easier and it annoys me that people taking the piss with 'flexibility' ruin it for everyone else.

Just to clarify, the children in question are aged 5-8. Not teenagers who can look after themselves.

This is why my employer refused WFH. I had to work hard to prove I'd get it done & can still only WFH if necessary on holidays etc. previously staff, DC or not, were not doing the work when WFH.

However, MY SIL/BIL have highly paid WFH jobs and do all pick ups/drop offs, help with homework etc and get away with it & no one notices. So it just depends on your employer, really.

If they are working at different times of the day and get the job done, nothing wrong with that in my opinion.

What the OP suggests is some doing less than others, which is not reasonable.

Yes that’s exactly it. Thank you

Have you got any examples of deadlines being missed/ customers complaining? Or is it just that you want to get something done that afternoon rather than the next morning (which is understandable but not a major issue if it can be done the next day). When you talk about others picking up the slack- what does that look like? Why can’t you just say “oh I am sure that Amy picked that up earlier so I would contact her.” Or just IM Amy’s manager and refer it to her!

I think you need to be very careful to not make it look like you’ve either got a grudge or are just annoyed because it’s about personal preferences about when work gets done rather than a business need.

Yes I do need to consider this. I don’t know if I will say anything but if I do I definitely need to consider a lot of what you have said. Appreciate it, thank you

I think it depends. I wfh but DD is age 10, she will have a friend over and they’re self sufficient aside from lunch. I don’t see them for hours.

I had to performance manage someone who didn’t arrange any childcare for a baby :( so awkward but we had a duty of care to ensure the child was being properly looked after, and no way could she be doing her job while looking after a baby! For older kids though this is fine for them to be in the house while people work - it’s making the workplace so much more accessible for women in particular that employers are being more flexible and reasonable.

Never been the same since covid though has it

I think you’re in the proper grey area for those ages tbh. I’d feel very comfortable saying it’s totally inappropriate for under 5s and being quite hardline on that. I personally prefer to put my 6 year old into holiday camp 90% of the time as I don’t think I can do my job all week with her around but I might do the odd day at home in the summer. At that top end of that age range at 8, some kids could be absolutely fine to potter for a day with toys and a screen and minimal supervision and there be no impact on work.

Same, when my kids were young I worked half my week from home, before the pandemic and wfh proliferated. Policy was clear that you should not be responsible for young children whilst wfh. Mine went to after school club. When the eldest got to around p6 (10) I let him come home on the bus and he looked after himself but he was self sufficient and didn’t need looking after

You are still being paid to work though. Taking a late lunch for a school pick up and having kids at home for a couple of hours before finish time is entirely different to skiving off looking after kids over the whole school holidays. Ultimately it will be the piss takers who spoil the much needed flexibility for other working parents.

Depends on the job. If you work on daily targets, have to be on the phone to clients etc then it is not.

If you are a project manager, and have 2-3 projects that are 3-36 months, no one will die if you respond to a message or an email with few hours delays. Many places discourage constant availability over teams etc as it is distracting and you cannot get anything done, especially if the work involves planning, budgets etc. In that case if you do your job and you do it well and on time, who cares when you do it?

As you can probably say - I hate micromanaging..

I do this.

3.15pm-4pm is very honestly blocked off my calendar as "school run". There are no meetings I have taken that can't wait until 9am the next day.

During half term, my kids are at grandparents house 3 days in the week and I "juggle" work/childcare for the remaining 2 days.

Summer and winter holidays the kids are with me but work slows down massively to accommodate everyone else's annual leave! So I end up working the most during that time, ironically, since I am the only one still online.

My manager is big on "as long as you do the work, I don't care about your hours". I wonder if he'd think differently if I ever told him how many hours it takes me to do the job.

depends on the job, surely.

If you are a receptionist, presenteeism litterally IS the job.
If you are a salesperson, your numbers are the only thing that matters.

Most jobs are a bit in between. If you work truly independently, no one cares if you work at 11am or 3am as long as the job is done.