To be angry with holiday camp?!?!

[Woolwichchicken]

I’ve booked several morning sessions 9am-1pm with my daughter so I can do some KIT work on maternity leave. The camp is at her school but run by an external company.

they have taken her on an all day trip to central London, I knew the trip was happening but stupidly assumed she would be be going as I had only booked a morning session. I assumed some of the staff would stay at the school campus with the morning kids.

i know it might sound silly but I’m don’t feel comfortable with people taking her to central London as the camp is mostly staffed by people who seem to be teenagers. We went to pick her up at one and jo kids came out. They also aren’t picking up their phone, so now I’m having a full on panic that she is somewhere in central London.

As a disclaimer I know she goes in school trips, but that is with her teachers who are much more experienced.

People do this all the time, and expect others to make sense of their posts. It's so lazy.

Probably the OP wrote to the school saying "You definitely can take my daughter to London" but meant to say the exact opposite.

Appears a pp knows of this summer camp and that there is a trip every Friday, even though they don’t say their child attends, so I’d hazard a guess this is more an issue with the OP not reading the information given properly rather than the camp not explaining.
Was booking and payment done online and you didn’t notice there was no option for a half day on a Friday?

Why do school trips make you anxious?

If it’s the camp I’m thinking of they were back at 3.15, 2 hours extra. First read the instructions, secondly to spend holidays at school is dull, a chance to go out to something different you might not have picked is a nice thing. I like their model of Friday trips.

I guess they want all of the animators to accompany the group to the city. What's the ratio? How many children per "teacher"? By assigning a person to watch your daughter they would've had less security in the group. My grandson (9) does daycamps too, and yes, all very young people with the children. But they're very motivated and often have experience in scouting or other youthgroups.

When I was just 18 I had a summer job working with French visiting students. I lost one in central London after we’d all travelled up by coach for couple of hours. Can’t recall all the details but know she was eventually found by police / transport police many hours later and the coach had already had to leave with all the others. So I was 18, quite a country bumpkin myself stuck in London waiting with transport police and having to catch the last train home with a 14 year old French girl. I hardly even spoke French. Looking back and now a mother and grandmother I find it all quite shocking but no one did at the time ( (70’s). Sorry OP I know your DD will now be home safely hence my story, wasn’t to worry you

That’s not right at all that the children had to wait until they got back at 3.30 to have their lunch, And shocking that the staff bought food for themselves while the children had to watch. Why on earth didn’t they all eat at lunchtime?
I used to work at a day centre for adults with learning disabilities, we often had days out with packed lunches ( either brought in from home or made for them by us) .
Stopping for lunch was an important part of the day out and us staff would make sure everyone was happily eating their lunches before we started ours.
Very unkind of the staff to expect the children to watch them eat while the children went without.

They text the op about it that morning

I receive a text like that… I bother to pick the phone up or when I drop - clarify the situation

Having worked for many summer camps as a late teen myself I can see completely why/how this happened. I had some crazy experiences leading trips to big cities I’d never been to myself etc… a pp is right that the staff will be highly motivated. It is also true that despite their youth 1000s of kids are cared for by staff like this annually and actual tragedies are almost unheard of so it does work!

I’m shocked about the responses that don’t seem bothered. You’d expect to have signed permission slips for this, have it all risk assessed etc. Glad she’s back ok what time did she get back in the end?

I'm glad she had a good time OP. You're not wrong to assume she wouldn't be going though. I'm a teacher and the amount of paperwork involved in trips is huge. Their risk assessment (if they even had one) would have been incorrect due to staff children ratios. They wouldn't have had a permission slip signed. And then some kids spent a day in London with no lunch!

I'd be looking elsewhere for childcare.

The Op received a text message the morning of the trip

You would not think to perhaps raise it when you dropped off?

Poor kid

Yes, I would have queried it but they still shouldn't have taken the child.

I would bet a lot that the cock up is due to OP

I think you need to work on your anxiety or you’ll pass it on to your DD.