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Daycare Center and Family Home Forum>Interviews During Care Hours?
LeslieG 10:54 AM 01-09-2017
I'm just curious when you all prefer to initially meet with families. I usually prefer to meet after care hours only for safety reasons. I know I may be a bit paranoid, but if I've never met someone in person before, I feel a little nervous inviting them into my home while I have other children in care.

I currently have a family inquiring about setting up a meeting and would like to do it during the day. What are your thoughts on meeting during care hours?
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Heart12 11:01 AM 01-09-2017
Originally Posted by LeslieG:
I'm just curious when you all prefer to initially meet with families. I usually prefer to meet after care hours only for safety reasons. I know I may be a bit paranoid, but if I've never met someone in person before, I feel a little nervous inviting them into my home while I have other children in care.

I currently have a family inquiring about setting up a meeting and would like to do it during the day. What are your thoughts on meeting during care hours?
I only take interviews after daycare hours. I get nervous about strangers coming to my home when I am alone with the kiddos. When I worked as an assistant at another home daycare, the provider would take interviews during daycare hours. I felt like it always took her attention away from the kids, & made them get very ansy (sp?)
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daycarediva 11:05 AM 01-09-2017
Originally Posted by Heart12:
I only take interviews after daycare hours. I get nervous about strangers coming to my home when I am alone with the kiddos. When I worked as an assistant at another home daycare, the provider would take interviews during daycare hours. I felt like it always took her attention away from the kids, & made them get very ansy (sp?)
Yup. I do allow parents to come for a few minutes for their child's first day and meet the kids. But that's it.
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DaveA 11:07 AM 01-09-2017
I do interviews after daycare hours because I don't like splitting attention between interview and DCKs. Plu I want them to meet my wife since she's my primary sub.
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finsup 11:14 AM 01-09-2017
I only do interviews after hours. Safety is part of it. I feel pretty confident defending myself but I would rather not be put in the position where it's just me with the kiddos. Also, I don't feel like we can really go over things in depth if my attention is divided. There are some pros to doing them during regular hours though. Personally however, there's not enough of them to make me switch.

If a family asks, I just say I cannot do interviews during daycare hours since it takes my time and attention away from the kiddos. But I would be happy to set up after hours or sometime on the weekend. If I had an assistant, I would probably be willing to do it though.
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laundrymom 11:15 AM 01-09-2017
"I'm sorry mom and dad, but this world is t as safe as it was ten years ago. I conduct all initial interviews after hours. I'm sure you understand and appreciate the extra level of safety I provide the children in my care."
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Second Home 11:15 AM 01-09-2017
I only do interviews after daycare hours . I tell interested parents that it is for the children's safety and I am sure they they would not feel comfortable with strangers coming into my home if their child was there . That usually works and most understand the ones that don't understand it's a safety issue don't schedule an interview .
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Play Care 11:16 AM 01-09-2017
I do them during DC and I prefer it that way. I try to make it so that all DC work is done during the dc day, and this includes interviews. I arrange them when my assistant can be here so she takes care of the kiddos while I run the interview. I also let parents know that I *allow* 30 minutes for interviews as they can be disruptive. This way they know coming in that the clock is running.
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Baby Beluga 12:01 PM 01-09-2017
I only do interviews after hours. I don't really care for doing it after hours (it makes my day longer) BUT I wouldn't be able to split my attention between DCK's and the family that is interviewing. Plus, DCK's are CRAZY when someone new is around.

I just say something like "For safety reasons I schedule all interviews after hours. I have an open slot on Tuesday at 5:30pm, Wednesday at 6:00pm or Thursday at 6:00pm." Please let me know which day and time works best for your family." And go from there.
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jenboo 01:23 PM 01-09-2017
I do interviews only during daycare hours. I only offer them in the mornings between 9-10 and evenings between 4-530pm. These are my most calm times besides nap.
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Blackcat31 01:47 PM 01-09-2017
Originally Posted by jenboo:
I do interviews only during daycare hours. I only offer them in the mornings between 9-10 and evenings between 4-530pm. These are my most calm times besides nap.
I only do interviews during daycare hours as well.

I give the times I am willing to interview and the parents can choose what time works for them.

I have safety rules in play so that part isn't an issue for me but I refuse to devote my time outside of work to work.
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Meeko 01:49 PM 01-09-2017
I put it more politely to those who ask...but get the message across that parents pay me to give my attention to their child...not to be chatting with visiting strangers.

I say that I am sure THEY wouldn't want an untold number of strangers gawking at THEIR kids during the day either. They always agree when they see it from my point of view.
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Magic 03:13 PM 01-09-2017
I do interviews only in day care hours
one.. day long enough as is
but mainly so parents can see me interact with children , and I can see them interact with other children
and
so I can see all the children interact with each other
one of my last interviews the parent over stayed and in that time
the interviewing child almost took out an other child's eye about " 50 " times ...wow
if I had not seen this child with other children I might of taken on a child that turned out needed help beyond a day care providers help ..( I did get to see a follow up on this child else where ...licensing demanded he be removed from the day care ..
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284878 06:50 PM 01-10-2017
Originally Posted by Second Home:
I only do interviews after daycare hours . I tell interested parents that it is for the children's safety and I am sure they they would not feel comfortable with strangers coming into my home if their child was there . That usually works and most understand the ones that don't understand it's a safety issue don't schedule an interview .
I have said this plus my dh is gone on Monday nights, so I will not schedule one for then either.
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Lovisa 12:34 PM 01-11-2017
Only after hours or on weekends here. My day is WAY too crazy to try and have a conversation, explain everything and answer any questions while all the kiddos are running around being loud, needing diaper changes, etc. I wouldn't be able to concentrate! Plus, like was mentioned above, the kids seem to act EXTRA crazy when someone is here. Safety is an issue as well. And I don't have an assistant or anyone else on my license so no one else to watch them while the interview is happening. I don't mind doing it during non open hours. I can concentrate on the conversation much easier
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Gemma 01:03 PM 01-11-2017
Originally Posted by LeslieG:
I'm just curious when you all prefer to initially meet with families. I usually prefer to meet after care hours only for safety reasons. I know I may be a bit paranoid, but if I've never met someone in person before, I feel a little nervous inviting them into my home while I have other children in care.

I currently have a family inquiring about setting up a meeting and would like to do it during the day. What are your thoughts on meeting during care hours?
I only schedule interviews after all the kids have left, this is my policy and so far I have never had a problem with it
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WBee 06:07 PM 01-11-2017
Only after hours for all safety & chaos reasons above plus my STATE does not allow ANYONE to be in my house during business hours unless they are part of my immediate family(hubby & kids), clients or on my emergency contact list with BC on DCYF file. Not even a plumber or electrician are allowed. If DCYF shows up and my own mother is here, they would ask her to leave.
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knoxmomof2 02:01 PM 01-13-2017
I only do after hours, for several reasons. First, I prefer to give the interview my full attention. The things we are discussing (policies, pay, their child, expectations on both sides) and trying to tune in to these parents in order to detect any possible red flags would be too difficult for me to do while also wrangling the 4 children in my care. It's worth it to me to "give away" my time. Interviews are usually 2 hours with lots of visiting and chatter and I prefer it that way because I want to get to know them if I'm going to be caring for their child for (hopefully) the next few years.

Also, safety would be a concern when I'm meeting a random stranger and then inviting them into my home during the day with my own children and the daycare children present. I try to schedule interviews for nights my DH is home, but now he's on nights so that's going to be impossible. I just try to do a lot of "reading" them ahead of time, based on our conversations/ emails and I do try to find them on Facebook.. that helps a LOT!

I've only had 1 parent ask for that. She was torn between a daycare center and my home care, so I'm sure she read a lot of advice about asking to see the provider in action with other children. I just let her know that, once we met, if we both decided it was a good fit, I could check with the other parents about her coming to visit for a bit one day and expressed that my setup was much different than a center, in that I didn't have the "safety in numbers" aspect that they did. I also mentioned that I would pay the same amount of attention to the safety and security of her child, were she to hire me. She was very understanding of it once she realized the issue.

I didn't get the job, but she was on the fence about center care and her best friend worked at a center, so I get it. The baby's father spent the whole time on his cell phone as we chatted and really seemed disinterested in the whole thing anyway, so I wasn't really impressed. This was an infant, 6 weeks old and they were looking for care around 12-16 weeks. HOW do you not pay more attention? Yeesh!
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Josiegirl 03:00 AM 01-14-2017
Originally Posted by Blackcat31:
I only do interviews during daycare hours as well.

I give the times I am willing to interview and the parents can choose what time works for them.

I have safety rules in play so that part isn't an issue for me but I refuse to devote my time outside of work to work.
I wish I could be you. Every single time I'm spending hours on a weekend doing something related to dc, I'm thinking 'how in heck does BC do it?' Lol AND with so many more dcks than I have! I must be disorganized or have never been able to train these kiddos or something.....
Anyways, I used to meet during dc hours when my family still lived here. Now I meet after hours because I have so much free time(as in no family to take care of), feel less stressed trying to answer questions, show them around and explain things, and all that jazz. And if they ask, I am right up front and tell them. If they choose to stay a few extra minutes their first days here, then that's fine too. I remember parents in the past who ended up staying for hours, joined in our activities, oooh I didn't like that but never really knew how to kick 'em out.
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Texasjeepgirl 01:16 PM 02-01-2017
Originally Posted by Play Care:
I do them during DC and I prefer it that way. I try to make it so that all DC work is done during the dc day, and this includes interviews. I arrange them when my assistant can be here so she takes care of the kiddos while I run the interview. I also let parents know that I *allow* 30 minutes for interviews as they can be disruptive. This way they know coming in that the clock is running.
EXACTLY THIS... every word....
I have a very busy life after hours.... my husband and I are pool players....so many nights per week I am waiting for the last child to leave so that I can shower and get ready to go....on the nights that I'm not playing pool...I can assure you I'm busy doing SOMETHING...and I have ZERO interest in meeting with clients... I find it bad enough that I have to attend training sessions after hours......Many years ago I tried a few times to meet with clients after daycare hours and it was always SOOOO ANNOYING.... no matter how you stress ahead of time that the interview needed to be brief...seems they would always stay FOREVER...and the children would drive me INSANE because well...it was after hours... I spent all day caring for children...it's the LAST THING I want to do after hours.... I do the same as the person I quoted... I schedule interviews only for when my assistant can be here to care for the daycare children so that I can focus on the potential client..

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cassiesue 05:48 PM 02-02-2017
I also agree with PlayCare's rules and that is basically what I do. As I offer 23.45 care anyway all interviews have the potential to occur when dcks may be present.

I prefer to schedule them after breakfast, but before lunch. I require they fill out all paperwork on the premises, but allow them to do that in my living room. I even allow them to use my wifi or a tablet if need be as most do not have all the info required to fill out the form. I only do interviews when my assistant is present though.
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