Children are too ill to go to nursery - do I have to pay cancellation fees?

[Elenus]

Dear mums, you were helping me a lot in the past, and now I badly need your opinion....

We had very eventful last 3 months with our twins - my son had pneumonia 3 times already and doctors say it is virus-induced. He now in the hospital with the daddy and he is very very poorly. I'm at home with my daughter, who is wheezing and not feeling very well at all. Over the last 3 months kids were attending nursery no more than 5 weeks in total due to illnesses. We were hoping for the miracle, but clearly it is not happening and we need to take kids out of the nursery as it became very very dangerous (last pneumonia is very bad and we don't know how much time is needed for recovery). Nursery agreed to do 4 weeks cancellation fees instead of 6, but it is still a lot of money for 2 full-time kids. I lost my job due to all those things which happened over the last 3 months, so we will be hardly coping. I know it is not their fault (but I can say their hygiene standards seemed to me very questionable, but it was overall a good nursery), but it was not our choice ether, even in our darkest dreams we could have imagined all those things happening. Any advise?

Many thanks in advance, your help much appreacited.

Sorry but I think you should pay - it is not their fault that the places were not used.

Yes I'm afraid you do. Sorry about your twins health but you entered onto a contract.

Sorry your family is having a crap time.

But I think the nursery are being reasonable charging 4 weeks instead of the 6 weeks that you were contracted. Nurseries are full of germ-ridden children, and it is normal that children catch every bug going for the first few months. Unfortunately for you and your twins, this has affectd them more severely than other children, but at the end of the day, you entered into a contract for.childcare and have chosen to cancel it.

Ladies, many thanks for your answers and kind words! I understand all the reasoning... but

I feel a little betraied as I asked to keep my side of the contract but I feel that nursery did not seem to keep theirs - they never turned away kids which were so poorly and could barely sit on the chairs.But people seemed to be very nice to DS and DD, but they were sick a LOT. They'd never been sick before they started, not even once and were happy healthy babies despite being abroad, on planes, traines, playgroups etc

thanks again, just needed to vent out, so upset....

Elenus, so sorry to hear about your DTs being poorly. Mine were premmies and it was one of my big concerns about nursery too. Have you looked into a nanny? For twins the hourly rate is often not dissimilar, and you don't lose days when one or both of them is too snuffly to go in, plus they're not around other sickly kids all the time (plus you'll probably get meals prepped and washing done too!).
Seriously missing ours here.

Dear TwelveLeggedWalk, thanks for your answer and kind words. Hope your twinnies are better now, I surely know how hard it is
The reason we did not consider nanny at the time as we were a bit paranoid to leave kids with the stranger alone, but now we are looking as I think we overcame our paranoia about nanny and got another one - about viruses;) Another concern was development - do you think nanny will be able to do prep work for the school? What would be your observation? Many thanks

Elenus - you can always start the twins at nursery later - thats what I did - we had home-based childcare until they were 2, then they started at a private nursery. Worked very well for us.

Hope their health is improving. Unfortunately, I think little ones are prone to infections especially around other babies / toddlers.

Of course you have to pay.

It is normal for children to pick up lots of bugs when they start nursery, DS has always had chest problems and both times he has started a new nursery has ended up hospitalised with them again

I hope they are feeling better soon but you really can't avoid paying.