Staying Later Then Scheduled Time

[Abigail]

I have $5 for every 10 minutes or part thereof.

That's a good phrase to add "or part thereof". It means 1-10 min late = $5. 11-20 minutes late = $10. And so on. Otherwise, they will push it and say, "well, I was only 9 minutes late and your contract says PER 10 MIN and I wasn't 10 minutes late. So you can't charge UNTIL I'm 10 minutes late." Trust me, some people know how to twist and turn every little thing around and make it seem vague and open to interpretation.

Love it! I will have to add this. Do you keep the examples in the handbook or contract? I suppose if you didn't have the examples stated then someone would say they were two minutes late so they only owed you $1 from the $5 10 minutes late fee....meaning a fraction thereof. LOL

Can someone help me with contracted hours? I have several families who have kids from split families, alternating homes, parents have have different work schedules...one mom has two different jobs with varying daily hours, the dad is a farmer and his hours vary, another family has a mom that her job location changes daily as does commute time....am I out of luck on contracted hours then?

For your split families you could do this two ways: ONE, tell each parent they need to sign their own individual contract because they are the one requesting care for those days for each child. They need to be held responsible directly with you, not through the other parent. Especially if one pays one week and the other the other week. Who says that the dad sticks with you for the week he has the kids for whatever reasons and mom decides that she found her relative or someone else to care for her child(ren) on her weeks....you really should have two separate contracts. It might sound confusing at first, but it will make sense. Treat each parent as a separate client. OR TWO, you can request the parents work together and have the same person pay you each week. I will just become sticky when you have each parent picking up and dropping off at different times. I would still recommend your individual contracts and treat them as separate clients having each pay part time rates unless they are on the same page and one parent pays for the weird hours. The only difference I guess is if the hours each week change.

For the parent with two different jobs with varying day hours: just have her contract state her specific hours on each day of the week. Mon, Wed, Fri might be the same hours and Tues, Thurs might be the same. If she does week one and week two schedules, type up the same thing that these hours rotate on a weekly or bi-weekly basis. If you already know the hours, it will definitely help you create customized contracts per each client you already have.

It seems like you have many unusual hours. If you let me know what hours each family has, I could help you some more. Just break it down per client. Sure, you have a dad who is a farmer and a mom who works different jobs and families who are split, but you run your own business and say "Hey, these are your contracted hours." If they need care later or other times they can find a babysitter or family member to watch them or you can increase your "outside of contracted hours" rate

[MarinaVanessa]

Can someone help me with contracted hours? I have several families who have kids from split families, alternating homes, parents have have different work schedules...one mom has two different jobs with varying daily hours, the dad is a farmer and his hours vary, another family has a mom that her job location changes daily as does commute time....am I out of luck on contracted hours then?

I agree that if payment is alternated by each parent then you should have them each be contracted. I would add somewhere in there that "parent A" will be responsible for "payment every other week starting with the week of ___." Or something like that and then request that any changes (like parents switching weeks) be given to you in writing.

As for how to word a family with changing schedules, different work days etc. you could add to your contract that you only provide childcare for working/school hours and transportation time and/or request what the following weeks' schedule will be by the closing time on the last day of pick-up the previous week etc.

I have had DC parent's with retail and restaurant schedules before and their schedules would always be different week to week but they would get their work schedule 2 weeks in advance so I added in their contracts that they were required to give me their work schedules 2 weeks in advance. As soon as they got their schedules they would either call me or write it down and leave it for me. This now works for my DCM that works as a contractor but I changed it for her since she doesn't know that much in advance what her work schedule will be. She gives me her work schedule at pick-up on Fridays for the following week. She's still contracted for full-time, never stays over 10 hours a day or 50 hours a week etc. however she does pay a little extra to be able to have this "open" schedule.