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Here are lessons some of us parents have learned the hard way:
1) The contracts the daycare has you sign is legally binding to YOU but serve as guidelines for them.
2) It's their business and they reserve exclusive rights to have special requests for days off, and early release days. Your requests for days off might see you paying anyway.
3) Agreements made between you and them are made (on their part) as purely temporary until you can either be replaced or they aren't in the mood to abide by them.
4) Although they SAY they'll call all the parents on a morning that they, themselves, are sick--they just medicine themselves up and work around your child anyway. In my experience: six years of daycare, not ONE ever called in sick--but had the red nose and groggy stance of being heavily medicined. HOWEVER your child cannot show up sick.
It is extremely hard work, for little pay which begs the question why do they do it? Take my advise: dont ever use private home daycare if you can help it. Use the professional daycare centers if you can (or guilt trip relatives into it).
This is why my daughters went to the BEST daycare center in the world!!!!! I have had to use a few home daycares (as infrequently as possible) because I worked Retail and Lowe's don't close for anything but Christmas and New Years. Most of the time I begged the manager of the Daycare that they regularly went to to keep them for the day on the side, and mostly they would do it.
This applies mostly to home daycare business. I've dealt with only two business daycares and never did I get a day the business was closing because owner was sick or personal reasons. Real business' run like corporate america; they don't close. My daughter's day care only close on the days they told you in advance. As parents why would you choose daycare thats inappropriate for you.
This applies mostly to home daycare business. I've dealt with only two business daycares and never did I get a day the business was closing because owner was sick or personal reasons. Real business' run like corporate america; they don't close. My daughter's day care only close on the days they told you in advance. As parents why would you choose daycare thats inappropriate for you.
Lucky you if you were always able to choose perfect daycare. It's not always possible for a lot of us, sometimes we just have to find the one that works good enough.
There were times where I simply couldn't afford a daycare center. I had to work for a wage that did not pay enough to be able to pay those higher prices. Other times I had to work 2nd shift and in-home daycares were my only options. Most of these daycares were actually very loving and good for my kids. I only ran into one situation where I did not like the daycare but where I was living there was a shortage of good childcare and it took a few months before I was able to find a better one with enough room for my kids.
Now that my kids are all old enough, I only use after-school programs if they need childcare.
Back to the OP's topic. Yes, it is very annoying when these ladies take the day off and you have to scramble in a hurry. I went many years where I was always struggling with not enough vacation days to cover all the times I needed off, mostly for sick kids or because a daycare lady took the day off.
The worst part of it was that this daycare actually charged me for her vacation days and if the kids were sick. The part that really got me mad was that since the kids were there part-time during the school year, she automatically expected the kids to be there if the kids had a day of school vacation. The kids all had a week off for spring break and I decided to take one day off of work to spend with my kids during that week and she had the gall to charge me for the kids even though they weren't there! This is the one I mentioned above where there was a shortage of good childcare in that town. The kids didn't like her either and were always complaining. I was so happy when I was finally able to find an opening in a better daycare. That was also an in-home daycare but it was very good and I stayed there until I moved.
We use a home daycare and we are happy with it. I don't have a problem paying her for days that my child isn't there because it's not like she can take another kid for that day. She's still holding our spot, and that's what we are paying for on those days. She depends on that money for her income either way. So we pay her for our vacation days. We also pay her for her vacation days - just like I get paid vacation days at my job. It all seems completely reasonable to me.
I used a home daycare for my children when they were young. It was fantastic, the woman treated my children as if they were her own, my kids loved her, loved going to her house, and her two boys were wonderful with my boy and girl. She was such a good sitter that my children still keep in contact with her even though they are now in their mid-20s.
I was so grateful to find her after having bad experiences with "professional" daycare centers. My children stayed with her for many years, and she was worth every single penny I paid.
This is why we choose to have my wife stay home to raise the kids. It requires some financial sacrifice, but its well worth it to have our kids raised by us rather than professional babysitters.
When you hire someone to do a job, be it painting your house or babysitting your children, you need to really look into their policies, speak to people who have used them before, etc, to make sure they're a good match for you. Or follow the old saying that goes "if you want it done right, you need to do it yourself."
This is why we choose to have my wife stay home to raise the kids. It requires some financial sacrifice, but its well worth it to have our kids raised by us rather than professional babysitters.
I wholeheartedly concur! I understand that some people are single parents and need to work, however, I have a huge problem with the majority of parents who send their kid to be raised by babysitters so that they can enjoy the finer things in life. If you are willing to make sacrifices for your family then I don't see how you cannot afford to have one parent at home to raise the children. Again, the key word is sacrifice!
Also, I babysat for children in my home for a short time. If I (or my children) were sick and I canceled, I did NOT get paid for that day. If the child I was watching were sick and didn't come I did get paid. It was only fair!
I wholeheartedly concur! I understand that some people are single parents and need to work, however, I have a huge problem with the majority of parents who send their kid to be raised by babysitters so that they can enjoy the finer things in life. If you are willing to make sacrifices for your family then I don't see how you cannot afford to have one parent at home to raise the children. Again, the key word is sacrifice!
Also, I babysat for children in my home for a short time. If I (or my children) were sick and I canceled, I did NOT get paid for that day. If the child I was watching were sick and didn't come I did get paid. It was only fair!
I know daycare is a necessity for some, like you mentioned single parents....but I see way too many people at work where both parents work, the kids are raised by daycare from 6 WEEKS of age and up, yet they live in the upper-class parts of the area, drive expensive cars, are constantly going shopping on lunch break, go on Disney vacations every year, send the kids to private school (even though the public school districts where most of these people live are above average).
I could never see how someone could leave an infant at a daycare center unless it was a last resort. People need to see that their kids' well-being is more important than material things and $$$.
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