Ok, I will start by giving you all a background story on this family. Sorry but this is long.

Two years ago I enrolled a family into my daycare, at that time the little boy was just over a year old. When the dcm enrolled with me I was running a special low rate for single mom’s. (I really needed to fill spaces at that time and it was a quick way to do it). The rate that I offered this dcm was $400.00/month, that is a $250.00/month savings for this dcm compared to my regular full time rate of $650.00/month.

I soon became friends (to an extent) with this mother and I bonded really deeply with the dcb.

Six months after the family enrolled with me I informed the mom that I felt something was off with her son (he was really behind both cognitively and physically) and I suggested she take him in for an evaluation. She did take him in for an evaluation, A YEAR AFTER I SUGGESTED IT, and her son is autistic.

So here’s what’s going on…

I have had numerous problems with this mother;

1. Dropping off at 7:10am every morning when I open at 7:30am. I tried reminding the mother and asking her not to come until 7:30am, that never worked. Finally I fixed the problem by not unlocking my door until 7:30am on the bell. Unfortunately she still stands outside my door for sometimes upwards of 15 minutes and allows her son to bang on it! Her excuse is if she doesn’t let him he screams. If my husband leaves through that door and forgets to lock it she will walk right in. I get so upset over this! Last time it happened I walked to the door and said, “Gee, I didn’t realize the door was unlocked it’s not 7:30am yet.” She responded, “Ya but it’s 7:25am so close enough.” And then laughed. I was so mad! The extra 5 minutes would have given me enough time to finish getting myself ready for the day.

2. Sending her son to daycare with food and toys. I DO NOT allow outside food and toys in my daycare. I get so frustrated having to repeat myself over and over again! Yesterday morning dcb walked in with a chocolate tim bit in his hand! Her excuse is if she takes it from him in the car he screams so it’s easier if I take it from him.

3. She insisted 4 months ago that I cut out dcb’s nap because he is not sleeping well at night and it is stressing her out. I said no, everyone in my care naps. What exactly am I suppose to do with a LOUD autistic non-napping child at naptime?

4. In March of this year I changed my hours on Friday so I could close at 4:30pm. All but this daycare mom made accommodations for me to do so, dcm said there was no way that she could pick up at 4:30pm on Fridays. I had one Friday per month were I was truly closed at 4:30pm due to this mom’s EDO she had every third Friday off work. In June of this year the mom informed me that she would be using her EDO time for any of her son’s appointments so he would be here until 5:15pm (my closing time) every single Friday. OMG REALLY!? So, this whole time the mom could have been using her EDO time to get off a little earlier on Fridays to pick up her son by 4:30pm and she didn’t even breath a word of this to me. I fixed that one, I told her I was going to be closed every Friday at 4:30pm PERIOD, amazingly enough she has had no problems picking up her son at 4:30pm every Friday since then.

5. Wanting to pick up in the middle of naptime once a week every week. This started two months ago. Dcm said that she would be picking her son up at 1:30pm every Friday for her son’s appointments for autism. I told her that, that won’t work for me and she either has to pick up before 12:30pm or after 2:30pm. Her son is autistic and he is the LOUDEST child that I have. When mom shows up to pick up he is completely out of control. Screaming at the top of his lungs! So much so that I implemented Nan’s bye bye outside program for 2 weeks to re-train both the dcb and the mom.

6. She also asked me if he could have his therapy sessions at my house twice a week for an hour and when I said no for obvious reasons she huffed and stomped out of the house.

7. Today dcm walks in and says, “I know you don’t prefer to have drop offs and pick ups during 12:30pm and 2:30pm but all my son’s appointments on Friday got changed so I will have to pick him up during that time. I was like no I’m sorry that won’t work for me, he has to be picked up either before 12:30pm or after 2:30pm, I am not changing my policies for one person. She huffed and said she didn’t know what she was going to do then and stomped out the door. I was like, hmmm, didn’t we already go over this?

At this point, I have just about had it! Not only is this mom receiving a $250/month discount, but she insists on having MORE special than everyone else in my care. Also, had I known earlier her son was autistic I would have given her a higher than regular rate, not lower.

On top of that there is very little parenting going on, on mom’s side of things. Dcb is here from my opening until closing Monday through Friday. She even arrives earlier than my opening time and sits in the car with dcb waiting for me to open. I know for a matter of fact that mom doesn’t work until 8:00am and it only takes her 15 minutes to get to work! Dcm informed me that when she gets home her and dcb have supper, she baths him and puts him in his bedroom to watch a movie at 6:30pm until he falls asleep. She puts a baby gate up so he can’t get out. So Monday to Friday Dcb only gets 5 hours total of face time with dcm.

Dcm cannot control her son. He doesn’t listen to her. He will scream, hit, throw things at her and she does nothing to correct this behaviour. When he is with me he is well behaved, follows my rules and would never dream of hitting me or throwing stuff at me, he knows it’s not allowed. I keep his day structured and the same, as that is what works best with autistic children and in the end I think it keeps his behaviour very much in check and I am able to control him.

I just don’t know what to do at this point. I feel disrespected, taken advantage of, walked on and hurt.

Any advice?

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I am also starting the progress of SLOWLY changing my daycare down to only running a part time daycare. I want to be closed on Mondays and possibly tuesday. I was willing to stay open those two days for this DCM, my gf and another family that has been with me for 4 years until their children were in Kindergarten. But I don't think I'm willing to stay open for this mom on Monday and Tuesday with the low rate that I have her on.

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I think if you raise her rates (sounds like she's been getting a hefty discount for more than a year without an increase!) then your problems will disappear.

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Thanks so much, I think this is the route I will likely take!

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Considering she's violated about every single rule you have, I'd be quick to push her out the door and offer a discount for a new family to come in. (AND...not that significant of a discount).

This mom wants cheap and wants quality and wants what she wants. Put your foot down! It's your house and your rules and they haven't changed. You tell DCM you run the show!

And as for the discount, it expires next month! Give her notice this Friday that effective October 31, discount has expired. She needs to pay what everyone else is...even if you have to spread it out over time for her to get the concept.

(Example: your rate will increase $25 a week effective October 31 and it will increase by another $25 a week February 1 to reflect the change. If she has an issue, you can tell her she is still getting a $50 a month discount. Either she can deal or she can leave and pay someone A LOT more than you are currently charging her!)

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This!!!!
Excellent post

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I usually do not like to suggest this but . . . I think you should terminate/encourage parent to find "better for her" day care. What this parent relay needs is someone that can help her help her child someone with training in dealing with autistic children. (This did my step son a world of good)

Short of that start raising her rate so that on top of dealing with her you are not getting paid less.

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I can understand that you are frustrated with your dcm who is not following your rules. I have to say that you can't give her a higher rates than regular rates due to his special needs that you can get in trouble for that. But you can increase her regular rates.

About autistic child being loud, well, he can't help it. Some autistic children can be louder or not but you have to be patient with him whatever you can. All autistic children are different. It kinda hurts what you said about this since I have a daughter who has PDD on Autism Spectrum. My husband and I work so hard to get some help for our daughter and I taught my daughter everyday. Her behavior was awful and we work so hard to get her better everyday. You have NO idea what I am going through. Now she is doing much better and I am very impressed that I work hard with her. He may be screaming out of his lungs due to lack of communication. As you know, there are so many autistic children have trouble to take nap time because they don't know what is it. My daughter was like that when she was younger. Now she is 10 year old and she knows my routine for her to go bed every nights. It took a long time for her to understand about routine. I suggest you and your dcm to work together as same pages to help him to get better everyday if you want to.

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So you would of charged her a HIGHER rate of what you charge if you knew her Son was special needs that is discrimanation. Honestly instead of talking about Mom not being able to handle her child suggest she get family therpay to learn how to deal with her child special needs children are much more harder to handle then a normal child my heart goes out to the Mom because it seems she doesnt know how to deal with him except put him in his room to watch tv its sad for her and the child. Why couldnt he have therpay at your house too whats wrong with that its only to benifit the child? I had a PT come in and work with a child once a week before if the child NEEDS it then why not. I think Mom should find another provider who can deal with her time frame and what she can afford so term her instead of complain about it.

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I can understand why she doesn't want the therapy at HER home. Who would (just being honest). When I had DCK at my house we had a routine that I set. We'd go to the park, storytime, did preschool activities, baking & crafts. I wouldn't want a extra appointments that would infringe on the activities I do & would more than likely make the other kids in care miss out on things, too. A provider has to consider ALL the kids in her care & in some cases can't make SPECIAL arrangements for one child that affects ALL the kids.

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I actually would not have charged her HIGHER if I was AWARE that her son was autistic. I just would not have accepted him into my daycare in the first place because I DO NOT have the educational background to deal with an autistic child, mom is aware of this but still CHOOSES to bring him here. And if you will read my whole post you can note that I was the one that suggested that the mom get him in for an evaluation...it took mom a whole year to do this. He is in therapy now and she has someone trying to help her. Therapy WILL NOT be done in my house as it just won't work. The daycare is a wide open space downstairs and my upstairs is STRICTLY AN ADULT ZONE! It's my private home and I don't want other people in my upstairs area.

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Just get used to saying "NO" because I see you saying it to her requests more frequently!

You need to tell DCM that her discount is done. No way is it cost effective to work for any child for $100 a week!

And, I don't blame you for not wanting to care for a special needs child. I've turned my fair share down too.

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Agree, and its not discrimination; often it won't work with a regular daycare group "depending" on the degree. I termed a child last summer, mom downplayed the behavior and in the interview I didn't catch everything going on with her. I did it after two days, a long....two days.

Now take that combined with a really bad, disrespectful parent; I would term because reading the post it doesn't look like the mother will change. I would start looking to fill the space right away, place the add and charge full price. When you have a good set of parents it makes this job so much better.

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Actually, its not. Usually, rates are assigned at the group care level, meaning that the child is able to be cared for as part of the group and needs little special, one-to-one care that the other children don't receive. If the special needs child needs special one-on-one care and the schedule/activities/space/food/whatever to be altered for them at the provider's and/or the group's expense, then it would logical to charge more money to compensate for that. Plus, in some areas having a special needs child in the group brings the ratio down...which means the provider has to either take in fewer kids or pay an assistant. More $$.

And look at this way. This family is paying LESS than 2/3 of what the other families pay (am I right?) for way MORE one-to-one and MORE special.

And I'm just looking at it from a financial standpoint.

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So I spoke to the dcm today and informed her that I would be raising her rate by $50.00/month over the next 5 months to match my regular full time rate of $650.00. I told her that due to personal choice I would be down scaling my daycare to cut down on my workload and daily stress. She was irate! First she said she couldn’t afford $650.00/month and that she would be looking for another daycare for her son. Then she told me she would just have to see how it goes. When I asked her for a straight answer, she responded with could I have some time to think about it? I said yes you can have until tomorrow and then I need to know because I will be giving notice to a number of families tomorrow and I don’t want to give notice to an extra one if you will be leaving as well as I will be out that space. She was completely pissed! Said I was giving her no time to make a decision. I really think she just wants to soak me for the lower rate until it reaches a certain dollar sign and then switch her son then! She won’t be able to find daycare that is cheaper than $650.00/month in our area, it’s unheard of right now! I’m so frustrated. I will find out in 10 minutes what is going on.

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$50 a month isn't squat really and to be honest, I would have told her she has 4 months to figure it out since it's such a gradual change.

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Well dcm gave me notice. She said she is going to either try to find a cheaper daycare within a month or that she will just quit her job and go on welfare!

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Excellent

Now make her stick to the one month. Once she looks and can't find it she will stay with you because each month you are still cheaper than the others.

Doing the increase over five months is most likely going to cause you problems with her. It's five opportunities to protest. You have just received her first round. Have it be her ONLY round.

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Leave no wiggle room. Two weeks would have been enough time. Your just asking for her to argue and negotiate. I would have only told her of her situation. she is not looking out for your best interest only her own.........so who is going to do that, has to be you two weeks you would have been making what your worth, and know if you had to find someone to replace or it was going to work out for both of you.

I wouldn't even feel bad over her throwing it your face that she would have to go on welfare either. My answer would have been, well thats a choice we all have to make for ourselves.

UGH!!! I would talk to her and say your not comfortable with five months, and that as of this day, she has two weeks to decide if she is staying or going and that in two weeks the rate will be increasing to what everyone else is paying, your regular rate. You can't run a business on discounts. You have nothing to lose, except a thorn bringing you down.....gee wiz Have a solid contract for the future, handbook and policies

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You should start looking immediately then. What is your termination policy? Do you require written notice? If you do then I would give HER written notice for two weeks. I suspect she's just trying to draw you out to change your mind. Don't fall for it!!

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That is not your problem. Maybe going on welfare and being forced to deal with her son's issues will be good for them.

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I am not going to take on her stress. However, I fear for the dcb. Mom is going to look for the cheapest daycare she can. In my area 'cheap' daycares are either running over their limit to make up for the lost income or they are plain crap daycares. I fear that her son is going to be abused because of his disability or he is going to be bounced from daycare to daycare. I wish I could do more on my end, but I helped as much as I could already! It still hurts my heart though!

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