how did everyone elses nursery deal with snow day?

[gingernutlover]

dd's nursery is supposed to open at 7.30, it took me until 8.30 to get through and find out that there was one member of staff there who didnt know whether they would be open as other staff were "trying to get in"

I dont know whether to be annoyed or not. I mean, primary schools round here (I work in one) know by 7am whether they are opening or not and a parental acscade is put into place to let the parents know.

The nursery is owned by Asquith and has a texting service for when there are outbreaks of flu at nursery or for when they advertise their open days [hmmm]. Am i being unreasonable to think they should just decide one way or another before opening time and text everyone? It's obviously an automated system so i doubt it would take much effort.

There was similar confusion last year, except the snow wasnt too bad, so I turned up at nursery only to have to stand there for 20 minutes while they faffed about decided whether to open (there were 2 staff members ther but not the manager).

Is this normal? Or do others nurseries have systems in place?

Oh, I should say that at 10am ish they issued a list iof nurseries open on the website - how very helpful (not).

Maybe they didnt know if staff could get in? as they wouldnt be able to open with not enough staff.
Having said that personally I would have let anyone in as they obv had the correct staff for the moment. if they decided to close later they could have rung you.

i realise that

our head rings everyone at 7am to ask whether we can make it in, its not hard, by 7.10 the decision is made. By 7.30 all the parents and staff are aware

Just find it strange that a school can make a decision but the nursery wont - weird and very unhelpful.

i think my main problem with this is that I need to know whether I am goig to work or not, for definate at 7.30 am. This is when the nursery opens.

It's no good knowing an hour later, for me and for a lot of other parents.

DS nursery opened but they combined the baby and todler rooms as so few children made it in. Only 2 members of staff there, 1 being the owner.DS had to go in as I had work but they said they were closing at 3.30 (right in the middle of DS sleep) so I had to rearrange clients etc so I could pick him up before then.

Our nursery had the opposite problem. Some parents didn't get back till 7.30 pm on Monday night. All the staff got to go home except the two girls wh were on till 6. The nursery owner says she won't charge parents the correct amount as it's £5 for every 10 minutes late but is going to pay the girls for their overtime. So fwiw it can go the other way. Obviously there were extenuating circumstances.

I dropped off DS at 8am as normal. The staff there said they weren;t sure how long they'd stay open since some staff were dependent on buses to get in and no buses were running at that point. I got a call at 11am to tell me they were going to close at 1pm so I had to take a half day. It's just the way it goes. They were going to open tomorrow morning but now are closed.

DD's nursery said as a general rule that if the buses were running then they would be open.

There is a sign up saying please try not to come too late as staff need to make it home.

ah ha! I was obviously not the only one who complained. Last night we were sent a text warning us of the bad weather and to check the website which would be updated from 6am. DD's nursery appeared on there at 7am.

Now, how hard was that?!? Well done Asquith (at last!) LOL

We're in London, not much snow here so nursery is open as usual but they have asked if possible that parents collect children by 4pm as heavy snow is forecast for early evening and they want to make sure staff and pupils get home safely. They will however stay open till 6pm for any parent who can't make it by 4pm. I think they have been very very reasonable given that some schools and my uni in the same area have shut down today!

I was asked to collect my DS as early as I could yesterday so that staff could get home. The buses stopped running here yesterday and are not running today either. Got a call at 7.45 this morning (official opening time 8am) to say they would be closed today. I am able to 'work from home' (ha! with DS about) easily today so not so bad for me, though it probably means I'll have to do more when he's gone to bed. We had also been told to ring and check before bringing children in. I'm sure it's a big inconvenience for some parents, but I'm not sure what else can be done as official travel advice is don't drive except in emergencies.

thats good to hear, I'm going to collect her as early as poss as we are supposed to get more too (just south of M25 here).

oh and I wasnt complaining about whether they were open or not, more about the fact they just didnt or wouldnt tell us

much less stressful if you know one way or another so you can let work know I agree

Nursery texted at about 0900 to say they would be closing at 1430. That seemed like good enough communications at least.

Nursery called about 4.30 to say would be closed tomorrow. Wouldn't be a problem as MrNC is usually home on Thursdays, except that for once he has 6 hours of meetings tomorrow and it's my first day back since Christmas and I need to get stuff for a course next week. MrNC is currently trying to find out if his stuff can be rearranged.

Ds doesn't go on Fridays but the manager said she wasn't taking bets on being open then either.

wow,that sounds bad nocitrus - where abouts are you?

My DD's nursery was open on Monday and yesterday but I couldn't get her in. Today nursery was closed and I was called at 7am on my mobile to advise. They'll call tomorrow and let me know if it's open. Unfortunately, I'm single mum with full time job so no work for me so far this week (had Monday off). Fortunately, however, my boss is lovely and she just advises me to enjoy the snow!

South London. Turns out not to have been so bad so should be fine on Monday - I got into work by train no problem, wangled a laptop and came home again so have just introduced ds to snow (he's a bit unsure about it but giggled at me throwing it around) - will have to do 6 hours of work before Monday. Next-door neighbour helped play with ds while MrNC had his first meeting so now only worry is that MrNC will forget to press 'mute' before moaning about how bored he is...

We had a closure on the last snow day then called on Thursday and told to call at 10am. Explained that was too late and I would have to take leave. Then turn up today at 08:40 and told only open from 9am to 15:00 - so again, had to take leave.

The cherry on the cake is that because they are still "open" we will still be charged for a full day.

well today took the biscuit

they closed early (fine, altho roads are fine, but their choice) BUT they gave us less than half an hours notice. Second time this week they have done this, I have complained.

When I asked, staff said they knew what time they would close by lunch time, not sure why they decided not to tell us for another 2.5 hours

We were open throughout (I manage a nursery) but parents were told that if the snow worsened then we may close early. This didn't happen in the end although we only had 11 children in instead of 42!!!

My DS's nursery was closed Tues and Weds. Dh and I work at same place and share a car, we needed to leave at 8:15am at latest to get to work. Tried to phone nursery (should open at 7:30) every 2 mins until then but no answer, DH had to leave for work so had to take another day off work to be at home with DS. Nursery phoned at 9am to check if DS would be attending as they had only just got there and wanted an idea of numbers. The roads were fine on Thurs and shouldn't have caused any real delay and the staff live very locally, I reckon they were having a lie in.

Sorry meant to say tried to phone nursery on Thurs to check it was open.

My daughter's pre school has not been open since Wednesday so for three days but they have been very good and texted every morning or evening before to let us know.

do you check the asquith website?
they are quite good at updating it in the mornings

yes i agree they are good at updating the website in the mornings - but they were crap to give me less than 30 minutes for early closure and since not many people can check the asquith website every 5 mins while they are at work, we do depend on the texts (I would take a bet on the fact that the same amount of notice was given on the website too).

I was also sent an email to say it was closing at 4pm, the email was sent at 3.42pm that made me even crosser than the
text.

I emailed and complained, and after the accused me of lying and that I had got the time of closing wrong (which I hadnt) they did then apologise and promise that we will infuture get 1 hours notice - we will see I guess...

Oh, and her nursery is supposed to be an "outstanding" one ha ha ha!