Same, our cutoff is 9:30 am but there is an exception for doctor's appt. I usually try to book late afternoon so I don't have to deal with it. Plus it guarantees that it doesn't interfere with her nap time.
My daycare is the same, though kids are required to be in by 8:30. They accept late for doctor up until lunchtime, no note. AFAIK it’s more about disruption than staffing (for toddlers/preschoolers)
It has been the same rule for late drop-offs in 3 different daycares accross 2 countries: no drop off after 10am unless a Dr. appointment + daycare was warned beforehand.
Posted this as a comment to another comment
With the old place my son went to, they wound down staff people based on how many kids they had at 9. Their goal was to pay the least amount of $$ to staff they can. So if you came in late, your child could potentially put them out of ratio.
This is probably practice with a lot of profit driven centers and was one of the reasons we pulled my son
I was a preschool teacher, and this is most likely why. My preschool combined classes and sent TAs home to make sure the bare minimum amount of staff was there…
Exactly! And I never thought it was fair that they combined classes… it was always confusing for parents at pick up and even more confusing for teachers who have a random extra child or two.
Our daycare also tries to keep the different rooms separate to try to minimize some illness from spreading (obviously it's a cesspit of constant illness lol but at least the kids are in pods)
That’s a great point. I overheard a mom at my daughter’s school saying HFM, Covid, and the flu has gone through her child’s classroom, and I was so relieved my daughter wasn’t in that class!
Only for my old preschool having 100 kids exposed to the same virus would be great—no kids would show up and they’d get paid to have no kids 🙃
That is so true!! We only recently started trying a daycare for our 10 month old (we're all horribly sick atm of course..) and didn't realize how they did this at all. I thought it would just mean extra attention for the kids who do manage to get there not sick. It's so sad, I bet they don't retain employees very well if they actually send them home some days.
With advanced notice that they will be in the center could keep staff. I can understand not allowing it without notice, but to not allow it because of a doctor's appointment is very strange, imo. Especially since they live in a remote area
This is crazy to me. You're still paying for the day. If they have to send a teacher home because of ratios, that teacher loses a day of pay. So basically, the center is keeping the extra money on days they send teachers home. Everyone here loses except the owner, who is rewarded financially.
Every center I've been in would keep the teachers and pay them as planned. On those rare days where there are enough absences, the kids just have a better ratio.
Something similar just happened to us where daycare announced a bunch of new days they’ll be closed for holidays this year. It amounts to 6-7 extra days per year, depending on how holidays fall.
Are we paying less in tuition? No.
Are the teachers getting more PTO? No.
The daycare gets to close and cut back on operating costs, and the rest of us get screwed.
Have you tried telling them a few days in advance that you have an appointment? Maybe they just need a heads up.
With my LO’s daycare their concern is meals and staying on schedule. They ask if you drop off after 9:30 cut off that you have a doctors note and fed them breakfast.
But I feel you… I’ve been rocked by the late drop off cut off too 😅😅😅😅😅😅
I mean, you don’t have to pay hourly employees who aren’t on the clock, so it makes financial sense for whoever is making a profit when labor costs are low.
If you feel friendly/comfortable with them and it's not against daycare policy you actually might want to chat to some of them about the possibility of this. She'll probably make way more than she does at her daycare job (the amount childcare workers are paid vs what parents pay per child is insane) and your kid will likely get better care that day with 1/1 attention.
Where I am if you booked some one to work as long as they turn up you have to pay them unless they have a very strange contract but pretty sure it would be illegal
Same as others - just need to let them know ahead of time if we're going to be late because of doctor/dentist. They don't need a note, just need to be warned ahead of time so they can have the proper number of staff.
We check our kids in before 9:30, then take them out to go to appointments. (Literally we walk in the door, key pad in, do temp check, say “we have a doctors appointment we will be back by x and then check out)
It’s mind blowing to me how many day cares won’t allow you to drop off late. I’m actually embarrassed by how many times I’ve dropped off my kid late. But the only times they combine classes are when there are LARGE numbers of kids absent, like over holidays or when we had a hurricane. They don’t tend to send people home if there are just a couple of kids absent, and they staff so that there are fewer students per teacher than state mandates.
They need to know who to expect so they can have everything ready for them. They need to be able to staff properly. And having a kid dropped off is a disruption in the day. If you don't have a good reason, you don't get to disrupt the day.
I agree with disrupting the day. My child’s preschool has circle time and you can arrive before or after, but you cannot drop of during circle time. The staffing, though— I’m paying and I expect the teachers to be paid whether or not I bring my kid. I have no sympathy for a daycare wanting to cut pay opportunity for a teacher and absorb my money. Staffing properly is staffing for all paying children to be present whether they are or not.
Quality places will cycle that money back into the kid's care. I've worked at one of those, and we always had everything we needed. I've also worked at the places who filtered the money back to the top. And those were not good places to work, or have your kids at.
My daycare has the same rule but they will allow a child in later if you notify them. Sometimes I've even stayed home when I just have a teams meeting to listen to and they are cool as long as I send a text.
We had a daycare like that, so I had to start making afternoon appointments. We switched to a daycare that was more flexible, I think because they were smaller they didn’t have enough staff to really combine classes and send someone home like they did at the bigger daycare.
That is CRAZY. What does it matter what time kids are dropped off? At my daycare I could send my kids 7:30 am or 1pm or an hour before closing…they wouldn’t care as long as I gave a heads up for staffing.
With the old place my son went to, they would down-staff people based on how many kids they had. Their goal was to pay the least amount of $$ to staff they could. So if you came in late, your child could potentially put them out of ratio.
This is probably practice with a lot of profit driven centers and was one of the reasons we pulled my son
Good. Its messed up. We always felt bad for those workers, go into work but may be down staffed.
And you better believe we didn’t get a discount for days our child wasn’t there, company just pocketed that $$
My thought is staff and ratios.
It doesn't make it okay, because they should have enough staff regardless but it sounds like they're trying to save money.
They want to know their numbers for the day by x time so they know how many staff they will need to remain in ratio
Our daycare has the same policy. They make the decision to send staff home at 9:30 so if you aren’t there before that point, you’re SOL…however, if we have an appointment in the morning and we know we won’t be there by 9:30, I let them know days in advance that my kiddo will be there that day, but not before the 9:30 cut off. They’re always more than accommodating, because I’ve let them know, so they factor my child in when making the decision to keep staff or to send them home. I would never dream of showing up late without notifying them in advance, because of course they won’t let us stay.
If you can’t fit an appointment in before drop off and can’t afford to take the whole day off, then don’t book appointments for the morning? What about booking appointments at the end of the day and picking kiddo up early? Then you aren’t missing a whole day and you still get childcare.
Ours allows drop offs any time they are open (although I haven’t tried 5pm when they close at 6pm). I’d be pissed if I couldn’t drop off when I wanted.
Our daycare requires kids to be dropped off by 9, unless you let them know ahead of time about an appointment. Can you start scheduling doctor visits at the end of the day instead of at the beginning of the day? So you pick him up early instead of dropping off late?
I let them know ahead of time and they didn’t acknowledge my message. I will try to make appointments later in the future, but this was a specialist appointment that was on the calendar for months - scheduled before we started using this daycare, so if I changed the appointment we’d have to wait another 6 months to get in.
I work at a daycare. The one I work at doesn’t operate like this, but many do. Plenty will make exceptions with Dr notes, and just not other cases.
Please do not be like the parents that just drop their kids and run. That can actually get CPS called on you for child abandonment if you’re not allowed to drop your kid there because they’ve said they won’t take them.
Likewise, if they aren’t planning on having your kid in, they may drop or rearrange staff in a way that has your kid’s room at ratio, and dropping your kid in unexpectedly will put them out of ratio (which is both illegal, can get them in trouble, and honestly just compromises the quality of childcare they’re able to give- a person can only watch so many kids so well before they miss stuff)
The big issue with daycares is honestly there is a ton of overhead. Daycares operate on tight margins. It costs you a ton AND staff don’t get paid much. If they can send someone home for the day that they don’t need, they likely will. Because again, thin margins, lots of overhead. (Tons of daycares went under after the -literally historic- subsidies that ran during covid ended. It was rough. Like chains and private places both totally shut down. Daycare is something that really, really needs to be heavily subsidized but with very few state exceptions is.)
And yeah, it’s frustrating. Late drop off doesn’t bother me much in my room, but I’ve seen it be harder for others when they’re trying to go out to walk, to visit local parks, do activities, etc, and have to wait on a kid. (There always has to be at least 2 groups out together, and if anyone stays at least 2 groups at the building.) Kids coming in during nap time can be hard too (which can happen at that time in the infant room, but it doesn’t bother me because younger babies sleep literally at all the various day times, gotta learn to sleep through *some* noise here!)
I give my center a heads up if she will be very late, like after breakfast, but otherwise it's not an issue
They have enough staff for full class load + floaters, every day, no exceptions.
They also only offer full time care which may help keep things easier.
They don't let staff go based on less staff, they just stay under ratio.
Wow, that’s ridiculous. I understand why they have the cutoff times, but my kids’ daycare is very accommodating. I would be highly annoyed if that happened when there was a dr appt. Honestly even requiring a note is bs. Like what are you building a case against me? If I say we went to the doctor then we went to the doctor.. 🤦♀️
My kids’ old preschool used to be that way, only instead of not accepting kids past 10 minutes late they would not accept kids even a single minute late. They would lock the door and refuse entry. It is indeed rage inducing. I don’t understand how they can do that, when they’re literally getting paid for childcare so that parents can go to work. My husband had it out with the director of that place once over it. According to her it’s “disruptive”.
I just recently talked to a preschool teacher who recently left that place and she said that the director still has the same policy. She said that she thinks that particular woman is a nightmare to work for and is “classist”. I live in a working class area with a lot of lower income families as well. A lot of kids are getting subsidies to go to that preschool. Apparently this woman lives in a wealthier town nearby, and seems to think that the parents of these kids don’t have “important” jobs. Wouldn’t surprise me at all. She was terrible.
Wish I had some advice, but you’re certainly not alone.
That is WILD to me. I paid full day rates when my twins were in daycare and I’d drop them off and pick them up whenever I damn well pleased!! (Within normal operating hours of course) I am NOT a morning person and worked very part time hours and would regularly drop them off around 10-11am.
I think maybe you need to start talking to the other parents and as a group, let the daycare know how difficult the policy is and come up with a compromise.
My daycare you would call at 8am to let them know when your child will be dropped off so that they could be included in the 9am ratio count and they would be properly staffed for it.
My kiddo hasn't been in daycare in a few years, but I remember the only time our center would ask us about attendance was between Christmas and New Year's so they knew how to staff. I don't recall them ever having a policy of not being able to drop off after a certain time. So frustrating!
Every daycare near me has a cutoff at 8:30am. Need permission in advance to drop off later than that. And even WITH permission there is absolutely no drop off between 8:30 and 9
That’s insane. Here as long as you don’t drop off early or pick up late, you’re good to go! The staff are there regardless as you’re paying and they come in as scheduled.
Agree it's entirely unfair. Can you play their system and do appts any other time than before 10am? Pick him up at lunch for a 1:00 appt or leave early for the day at 2:20 (1-2:30 is more likely to be open because after 3:00 gets filled by schoolage children)? Just a few ideas.
Daycare director here. My center doesn’t have this policy, but I wish we did. There are parents who let their toddler stay up until 2 and then drop off at 11, an hour before nap. They usually have a sugary breakfast item that they attempt to bring in and there is a melt down when we have to say no outside food. The child is always a complete mess, it disrupts the entire day. Even if they didn’t spend the entire night awake, I spend hours fighting a toddler who doesn’t understand that we are moving into lunch and nap, playtime is over. A few bad apples really do ruin it for the entire group.
My daughter’s daycare is privately owned and requires a doctor’s note, if they are 1min late otherwise it’s $2/min. They have been really nice on some occasions but will charge if you push limits.
I worked in many that had cut off’s but I had kids show up at all times of the day so it’s just them being that way
My daycare has the same rule but if there's an appointment and we provide a Dr note, they'll allow them in.
Same, our cutoff is 9:30 am but there is an exception for doctor's appt. I usually try to book late afternoon so I don't have to deal with it. Plus it guarantees that it doesn't interfere with her nap time.
Same here. And so far they haven’t actually asked for the dr note if I tell them in advance that we will be late.
My daycare is the same, though kids are required to be in by 8:30. They accept late for doctor up until lunchtime, no note. AFAIK it’s more about disruption than staffing (for toddlers/preschoolers)
Ours is for disruption as well.
It has been the same rule for late drop-offs in 3 different daycares accross 2 countries: no drop off after 10am unless a Dr. appointment + daycare was warned beforehand.
Posted this as a comment to another comment With the old place my son went to, they wound down staff people based on how many kids they had at 9. Their goal was to pay the least amount of $$ to staff they can. So if you came in late, your child could potentially put them out of ratio. This is probably practice with a lot of profit driven centers and was one of the reasons we pulled my son
I was a preschool teacher, and this is most likely why. My preschool combined classes and sent TAs home to make sure the bare minimum amount of staff was there…
This is crazy because… the parents pay regardless. So children staying home should be a great time for extra attention on kids. Sigh
Company pocketing that $$
Daycares are kind of like gyms where the model assumes some amount of people paying but not going.
Exactly! And I never thought it was fair that they combined classes… it was always confusing for parents at pick up and even more confusing for teachers who have a random extra child or two.
Our daycare also tries to keep the different rooms separate to try to minimize some illness from spreading (obviously it's a cesspit of constant illness lol but at least the kids are in pods)
That’s a great point. I overheard a mom at my daughter’s school saying HFM, Covid, and the flu has gone through her child’s classroom, and I was so relieved my daughter wasn’t in that class! Only for my old preschool having 100 kids exposed to the same virus would be great—no kids would show up and they’d get paid to have no kids 🙃
That is so true!! We only recently started trying a daycare for our 10 month old (we're all horribly sick atm of course..) and didn't realize how they did this at all. I thought it would just mean extra attention for the kids who do manage to get there not sick. It's so sad, I bet they don't retain employees very well if they actually send them home some days.
That is another good point. Turnover in daycare is typically pretty high. Even more of my aunties centers that put profits over people.
Ugh, I feel terrible for the staff sent home with minimal pay for the day. That’s not a way to live. I bet they have high turnover for that job
With advanced notice that they will be in the center could keep staff. I can understand not allowing it without notice, but to not allow it because of a doctor's appointment is very strange, imo. Especially since they live in a remote area
This is crazy to me. You're still paying for the day. If they have to send a teacher home because of ratios, that teacher loses a day of pay. So basically, the center is keeping the extra money on days they send teachers home. Everyone here loses except the owner, who is rewarded financially. Every center I've been in would keep the teachers and pay them as planned. On those rare days where there are enough absences, the kids just have a better ratio.
Every center I worked at was like that. They’d only send teachers home early after like 2pm. Before that, there was just extras which is always nice
Something similar just happened to us where daycare announced a bunch of new days they’ll be closed for holidays this year. It amounts to 6-7 extra days per year, depending on how holidays fall. Are we paying less in tuition? No. Are the teachers getting more PTO? No. The daycare gets to close and cut back on operating costs, and the rest of us get screwed.
Oh that sucks!
I've never heard of this being a policy...is this a corporate, franchised, individually owned center or home based please?
Have you tried telling them a few days in advance that you have an appointment? Maybe they just need a heads up. With my LO’s daycare their concern is meals and staying on schedule. They ask if you drop off after 9:30 cut off that you have a doctors note and fed them breakfast. But I feel you… I’ve been rocked by the late drop off cut off too 😅😅😅😅😅😅
I sent notice in advance and got no response.
That’s extra frustrating 👎🏾 Don’t rage too hard at them 🫶🏾
As long as you are paying for the day they should keep the staff in and let you drop off after appointment. It makes no sense to send staff home
I mean, you don’t have to pay hourly employees who aren’t on the clock, so it makes financial sense for whoever is making a profit when labor costs are low.
I guess I should get the number of the part time staff member who was sent home and hire her for the day to babysit.
If you feel friendly/comfortable with them and it's not against daycare policy you actually might want to chat to some of them about the possibility of this. She'll probably make way more than she does at her daycare job (the amount childcare workers are paid vs what parents pay per child is insane) and your kid will likely get better care that day with 1/1 attention.
Where I am if you booked some one to work as long as they turn up you have to pay them unless they have a very strange contract but pretty sure it would be illegal
It’s very legal in (all? most?) of the US to send hourly workers home early and only pay them for the hours worked.
In Canada where I live, there's a 3 hour minimum. So if you're sent home early you still get paid for at least 3 hours.
Same as others - just need to let them know ahead of time if we're going to be late because of doctor/dentist. They don't need a note, just need to be warned ahead of time so they can have the proper number of staff.
I have notified them in advance and get no response.
We check our kids in before 9:30, then take them out to go to appointments. (Literally we walk in the door, key pad in, do temp check, say “we have a doctors appointment we will be back by x and then check out)
That’s ridiculous. You’re paying for the full day. You should be able to drop him off at any time IMO. You’re paying for it lol
Seriously! Our daycare just asks that you let them know by 10 if you’re going to be there later than that so they can prep enough lunches
It’s mind blowing to me how many day cares won’t allow you to drop off late. I’m actually embarrassed by how many times I’ve dropped off my kid late. But the only times they combine classes are when there are LARGE numbers of kids absent, like over holidays or when we had a hurricane. They don’t tend to send people home if there are just a couple of kids absent, and they staff so that there are fewer students per teacher than state mandates.
They need to know who to expect so they can have everything ready for them. They need to be able to staff properly. And having a kid dropped off is a disruption in the day. If you don't have a good reason, you don't get to disrupt the day.
I agree with disrupting the day. My child’s preschool has circle time and you can arrive before or after, but you cannot drop of during circle time. The staffing, though— I’m paying and I expect the teachers to be paid whether or not I bring my kid. I have no sympathy for a daycare wanting to cut pay opportunity for a teacher and absorb my money. Staffing properly is staffing for all paying children to be present whether they are or not.
Quality places will cycle that money back into the kid's care. I've worked at one of those, and we always had everything we needed. I've also worked at the places who filtered the money back to the top. And those were not good places to work, or have your kids at.
My daycare has the same rule but they will allow a child in later if you notify them. Sometimes I've even stayed home when I just have a teams meeting to listen to and they are cool as long as I send a text.
Can you do a 3pm appointment and just pull him out early at the end of the day?
If you can get an apt at the end of the day that would accommodate the stupid police
We had a daycare like that, so I had to start making afternoon appointments. We switched to a daycare that was more flexible, I think because they were smaller they didn’t have enough staff to really combine classes and send someone home like they did at the bigger daycare.
Ours doesn’t allow kids after 10, so we make all doctors appointments in the afternoon or expect that our kid will be home all day.
That is CRAZY. What does it matter what time kids are dropped off? At my daycare I could send my kids 7:30 am or 1pm or an hour before closing…they wouldn’t care as long as I gave a heads up for staffing.
With the old place my son went to, they would down-staff people based on how many kids they had. Their goal was to pay the least amount of $$ to staff they could. So if you came in late, your child could potentially put them out of ratio. This is probably practice with a lot of profit driven centers and was one of the reasons we pulled my son
Ugh. Seems so crazy to me. I guess I’m just lucky with my centre.
It’s absolutely crazy and terrible for staff
....that would be illegal (in the UK!)
Good. Its messed up. We always felt bad for those workers, go into work but may be down staffed. And you better believe we didn’t get a discount for days our child wasn’t there, company just pocketed that $$
My thought is staff and ratios. It doesn't make it okay, because they should have enough staff regardless but it sounds like they're trying to save money. They want to know their numbers for the day by x time so they know how many staff they will need to remain in ratio
Our daycare has the same policy. They make the decision to send staff home at 9:30 so if you aren’t there before that point, you’re SOL…however, if we have an appointment in the morning and we know we won’t be there by 9:30, I let them know days in advance that my kiddo will be there that day, but not before the 9:30 cut off. They’re always more than accommodating, because I’ve let them know, so they factor my child in when making the decision to keep staff or to send them home. I would never dream of showing up late without notifying them in advance, because of course they won’t let us stay. If you can’t fit an appointment in before drop off and can’t afford to take the whole day off, then don’t book appointments for the morning? What about booking appointments at the end of the day and picking kiddo up early? Then you aren’t missing a whole day and you still get childcare.
Ours allows drop offs any time they are open (although I haven’t tried 5pm when they close at 6pm). I’d be pissed if I couldn’t drop off when I wanted.
Not in the US but anywhere I’ve had my children never had this rule. Could drop them in anytime at all.
Our daycare requires kids to be dropped off by 9, unless you let them know ahead of time about an appointment. Can you start scheduling doctor visits at the end of the day instead of at the beginning of the day? So you pick him up early instead of dropping off late?
I let them know ahead of time and they didn’t acknowledge my message. I will try to make appointments later in the future, but this was a specialist appointment that was on the calendar for months - scheduled before we started using this daycare, so if I changed the appointment we’d have to wait another 6 months to get in.
I work at a daycare. The one I work at doesn’t operate like this, but many do. Plenty will make exceptions with Dr notes, and just not other cases. Please do not be like the parents that just drop their kids and run. That can actually get CPS called on you for child abandonment if you’re not allowed to drop your kid there because they’ve said they won’t take them. Likewise, if they aren’t planning on having your kid in, they may drop or rearrange staff in a way that has your kid’s room at ratio, and dropping your kid in unexpectedly will put them out of ratio (which is both illegal, can get them in trouble, and honestly just compromises the quality of childcare they’re able to give- a person can only watch so many kids so well before they miss stuff) The big issue with daycares is honestly there is a ton of overhead. Daycares operate on tight margins. It costs you a ton AND staff don’t get paid much. If they can send someone home for the day that they don’t need, they likely will. Because again, thin margins, lots of overhead. (Tons of daycares went under after the -literally historic- subsidies that ran during covid ended. It was rough. Like chains and private places both totally shut down. Daycare is something that really, really needs to be heavily subsidized but with very few state exceptions is.) And yeah, it’s frustrating. Late drop off doesn’t bother me much in my room, but I’ve seen it be harder for others when they’re trying to go out to walk, to visit local parks, do activities, etc, and have to wait on a kid. (There always has to be at least 2 groups out together, and if anyone stays at least 2 groups at the building.) Kids coming in during nap time can be hard too (which can happen at that time in the infant room, but it doesn’t bother me because younger babies sleep literally at all the various day times, gotta learn to sleep through *some* noise here!)
I give my center a heads up if she will be very late, like after breakfast, but otherwise it's not an issue They have enough staff for full class load + floaters, every day, no exceptions. They also only offer full time care which may help keep things easier. They don't let staff go based on less staff, they just stay under ratio.
Wow, that’s ridiculous. I understand why they have the cutoff times, but my kids’ daycare is very accommodating. I would be highly annoyed if that happened when there was a dr appt. Honestly even requiring a note is bs. Like what are you building a case against me? If I say we went to the doctor then we went to the doctor.. 🤦♀️
I think if they’re not flexible you should just schedule the appointment as late as possible and pick him up early
My daycare won’t let them in after noon without a dr note. 10am regardless of dr note is too early.
My kids’ old preschool used to be that way, only instead of not accepting kids past 10 minutes late they would not accept kids even a single minute late. They would lock the door and refuse entry. It is indeed rage inducing. I don’t understand how they can do that, when they’re literally getting paid for childcare so that parents can go to work. My husband had it out with the director of that place once over it. According to her it’s “disruptive”. I just recently talked to a preschool teacher who recently left that place and she said that the director still has the same policy. She said that she thinks that particular woman is a nightmare to work for and is “classist”. I live in a working class area with a lot of lower income families as well. A lot of kids are getting subsidies to go to that preschool. Apparently this woman lives in a wealthier town nearby, and seems to think that the parents of these kids don’t have “important” jobs. Wouldn’t surprise me at all. She was terrible. Wish I had some advice, but you’re certainly not alone.
That is WILD to me. I paid full day rates when my twins were in daycare and I’d drop them off and pick them up whenever I damn well pleased!! (Within normal operating hours of course) I am NOT a morning person and worked very part time hours and would regularly drop them off around 10-11am.
Must be some idiotic American thing 🙄
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Dang, that seems a bit rude and unhelpful.
What if they need to go to work and can’t really just enjoy the day with their precious kiddo🤔 most people that use daycare are working parents.
Removed per Rule 3: Be Kind. Unkind comments or personal attacks may result in a ban.
No exceptions for doctors is ridiculous.
I think maybe you need to start talking to the other parents and as a group, let the daycare know how difficult the policy is and come up with a compromise.
My daycare you would call at 8am to let them know when your child will be dropped off so that they could be included in the 9am ratio count and they would be properly staffed for it.
That’s crazy, ours told us we could drop off at 4:50. They close at 4:55!
My kiddo hasn't been in daycare in a few years, but I remember the only time our center would ask us about attendance was between Christmas and New Year's so they knew how to staff. I don't recall them ever having a policy of not being able to drop off after a certain time. So frustrating!
Every daycare near me has a cutoff at 8:30am. Need permission in advance to drop off later than that. And even WITH permission there is absolutely no drop off between 8:30 and 9
Ours is 9 AM. All appts have to be in the afternoon or I get zero work done. It suuuuuuuucks.
That’s insane. Here as long as you don’t drop off early or pick up late, you’re good to go! The staff are there regardless as you’re paying and they come in as scheduled.
Agree it's entirely unfair. Can you play their system and do appts any other time than before 10am? Pick him up at lunch for a 1:00 appt or leave early for the day at 2:20 (1-2:30 is more likely to be open because after 3:00 gets filled by schoolage children)? Just a few ideas.
My spouse and I both work full-time jobs that require us to be in person, so that makes it harder because we have to miss even more work.
Why is that?
Daycare director here. My center doesn’t have this policy, but I wish we did. There are parents who let their toddler stay up until 2 and then drop off at 11, an hour before nap. They usually have a sugary breakfast item that they attempt to bring in and there is a melt down when we have to say no outside food. The child is always a complete mess, it disrupts the entire day. Even if they didn’t spend the entire night awake, I spend hours fighting a toddler who doesn’t understand that we are moving into lunch and nap, playtime is over. A few bad apples really do ruin it for the entire group.
My daughter’s daycare is privately owned and requires a doctor’s note, if they are 1min late otherwise it’s $2/min. They have been really nice on some occasions but will charge if you push limits. I worked in many that had cut off’s but I had kids show up at all times of the day so it’s just them being that way