AM I BEING REALLY PETTY HERE

[coolj]

I have a mum whose DD starts at 8.45am every morning. The past couple of weeks she has been getting earlier and now comes at 8.35am. Every morning I say 'oh you are early today' but she doesnt get the hint. I know it sounds really petty but at that time in the morning my own DSs have just gone to school and I am sitting down to a quick breakfast myself.

This morning it happened again and I said 'would you like to start at 8.30am instead every morning as Im at my breakfast, but she looked at me and said 'oh thats much too early. .

It makes me soo angry

Maybe the clock at her place is fast? If so seems oblivious? I'm not sure! Must be annoying

It could be something really simple like your clock runs a couple of mins slow, hers a couple fast!
Also - does she have a difficult journey to you? She may find it hard to judge the exact time of the journey?

Say to her, nicely, 'if you can manage to leave it til 8.45, it means i can have had my breakfast after the kids have gone to school, and be all ready to look after XXX'.

Not sure you need to get actually angry about it!

no its not petty. i would mention that your not able to take the lo any earlier than contracted.

i would keep her waiting on the doorstep one morning and say sorry you were still getting ready.

good luck x

Either don't open the door until 8.45 - could you buy a clock to place there so she can see what time she's arriving? Do you get her to sign her in/out she might notice that its before 8.45 if she has to keep writing the time etc.

Or

Accept that she will be with you anytime after 8.30 - so have breakfast earlier and charge her for your time - if she asks why the extra when presented with her bill you canshow her on your register that she has been recieving care from 8.30 until ... so you have ammended the bill accordingly.

Those sound like good ideas, But actually SAY to her that you need her to arrive at the agreed time before you put them into practice!

I know that when I used a childminder, if I arrived 10 mins late to pick them up - thanks to London traffic - she would divide the hourly rate by 6 and charge me for the extra minutes. That seemed fair to me - she'd worked them. Would have thought the same would apply here.

I got told off very sharply the other day for trying to leave my youngest at nursery a bit early. 25 seconds early to be precise! I'd tell her that she's leaving her child early which means you have to arrange your morning differently, so you'll be charging for the minutes. Unless it happens only occasionally, in which case maybe let it go and just share your toast with the lo.

I am having the same problem of early drop offs too, with my afternoon mindees, it is annoying as working alone with children you need to be ready for them when they arrive

you need that 10 mins to let your thoughts roam uninterrupted, to drink a cup of tea while it's hot, and put food into your mouth

I am going to accurately record times on attendance log, and if over a fortnight contracted hours are not stuck to I will offer to review contract to include these hours, or if parent would prefer, we can stick to the hours we are contracted for.

Unless you work alone with children I think it is hard to see how much it irks to be robbed of those 10 mins of calm before your working day (with no breaks) begins.

My childminder is very clear with me. She opens at 8 and she closes at 6. She doesn't make excuses- that is what she does, end of. It's a bit like a shop- get there too early and they are closed. That's it.

I have no doubt that my CM (who I think is great, incidentally) would point at the clock and say, you are early/ late, and she would have a point. And I would be suitably embarassed. Nip it in the bud, seriously, maybe her watch is fast or something?

Hiya,

I actually have stated in my contracts to "please do not arrive earlier than the agreed start time, without prior agreement as I have personal/private matters to attend to before my working day commences". I don't have any early starters any more! I used to have one like you have now who was always early to drop off and late to pick up and it then meant I would have my morning disrupted and then be late for collecting my own child from activities.

I think it's a good idea to run your setting as any other business would, I mean if you arrived at Sainsbury's 10 minutes before they opened they wouldn't let you in would they?!

Lisa

I feel the same as so many of you. I think there is a couple of great ideas from both sammyk and lisad1. My mindee's mum has always been 10 mins early and 10 mins late, and I have always felt petty to say anything and have let it run for so long that now don't know what to do. But on some days that extra 10 mins allows me to give my dog a brisk walk on my own (without dragging toddlers through the fields) and clear my head. Even when I took on a new mindee which I sometimes drop off at school, I wrote a letter advising that I may not be back untill just before 9.00am (contracted time) she still stands there waiting for me. Love the little one though and everything else is happy so it generally makes up for this little niggle. Will definately write it in on any new contracts though.

I dont think its petty at all but you need to take the bull by the horns and either accept the mindee earlier and charge her, or warn her that you CANNOT accept child before the contract time, (say you have taken legal advice... and you insurance doesnt cover you) then make her wait in the car until you are 'OPEN'. Thats what a nursery would do....

I had a parent who kept doing this once. I suggested keeping some books in the car, so when they arrive early he could read to his DS until the start time. I then tried including a note in my newsletter to the effect that if people arrived early, I may not be dressed! I tried charging double time for the extra time (which it seems he was quite happy to pay for). I put a note on the front door saying no callers before X time. Eventually, I just resorted to not opening the door and leaving them on the doorstep - that seemed to work, but why did I feel so bad about it?

agree with body and twims

10mins makes all the difference

no not petty - definately have words - either she pays the extra or she stays in the car...not bveing funny but you need those moments to get your head together.

If it goes on you will end up feelign resntful and not liook forward to LO arriving - and LO will surely pick up on that?....

Hi this is a problem that i get but in reverse. My mindees parents used to come on time, on a couple of occassions they come late and i never charged them for it, its happened again and again in fact at least twice a week since.

I think in order for them to respect what you do you have to charge parents and give out early/late slips.

I charge 2.50 per 15 minutes a child is late maybe i should start actually charging it and i bet it stops!

Good luck and hope you manage to sort it out, little things can turn into grudges so best bet is to sort it out.

Hiya everyone, sorry my computers been down and couldnt reply sooner. Guess what, my little chat must have worked yesterday because she arrived only a couple of minutes early this morning.

She only lives two minutes drive away so there really is no excuse to turn up early because when she then drives to nursery with her other child the doors dont open until 9.00am. (Its only a 10 min drive away.)

I suppose the situation just annoyed me because I have really bent over backwards to accommodate the family (who I really like btw). But I suppose in this line of work it is easy for people to take you for granted some of the time and just not think that you actually have your own children and life too.