Originally Posted by nothingwithoutjoy:
I have always charged a 2-week "holding fee" which I apply to a child's last two weeks, to protect against getting ripped off with a family leaving without notice. But lately I've had a few parents who want to start asap--like next week. And I jump into hyper-prep mode, pulling together paperwork and doing a home visit and preparing the environment for the child, and it occurs to me that that 2-week fee should apply two weeks before enrollment, so I don't do all that and then have a family back out. How do other people handle this? Don't worry about it? Charge the fee and have the child start in two weeks? I can't quite see asking for hundreds of dollars the minute they say they want to enroll, but it's starting to make more sense to me that way. Thoughts? Thanks.
Curious what you mean by that?
When I enroll a family, I e-mail a file with all the enrollment papers in the file. Parents must print and fill out and return to me. I keep the file handy on my desktop so it's easily attached to an e-mail. Takes me about 2 minutes total to do that.
As for preparing the environment, I am not understanding what you mean...I dont really do anything different other than remove labels or name tags from cubby spaces, and bathroom bins and add the new child's name.
I don't have to change anything in my environment just for a new child since the child needs to fit into my environment not the other way around.
I could interview a family Thursday and have them ready to start Monday. (I do NOT prep my environment for interviews either. I want parents to see what they are going to see every day at drop off/pick up...not the cleaned up version, they will more than likely never see again..
)
I know you run a unique program so just curious as to what your methods are and why needing to start quickly throws a loop into things.....
