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So, I had one of my daycare parents quit without payment on Dec 8th. She didn't pay for the previous week because she "decided to go visit her mom"...um ok that's fine but you have a contract stating that if daycare is open, you pay for your slot. The previous week (thanksgiving week) I had gallbladder surgery, daycare was closed, no one had to pay.
Well, this parent decided that if I closed daycare during Thanksgiving week, then she would just extend her stay at her moms for an additional week. I explained that daycare was open bright and early Monday morning, everyone else showed up, she could have too, but she made the decision not to, that's on her not me.
So, December 7th she drops her kid off, and again doesnt pay! Her husband picks their daughter up that night and he speaks NO english so it isn't worth discussing with him IMO so the next morning, hubby drops their daughter off again. So now I see what's going on here, she's sending her non english speaking husband to drop off/pick up knowing that I can't discuss payment with him. Well, that didn't stop me, I was like "your wife has not been paying me to keep your daughter. I need to be paid or else I can't keep watching her" so he says "ok i tell her"...but he doesn't go for his wallet to pay me, which further annoyed me....but i'm like he might not have even understood what i meant, i'll call her during her lunch break.
Well, 10 minutes later I get a call from her and she is LIVID, screaming at me about how dare i discuss her business with her husband (um, what?) and that she would bring me my #^&!^ money and our friendship was over, blah blah blah...so I'm still calm, I'm like "I don't have a personal issue with you, I just want to be paid for my services, I watch your daughter 55+ hours a week, all I ask is to be paid on time" she *loses her mind* and starts screaming and swearing again "oh so now i'm a bad mother, you have to watch my kid to much, if it's too much for you to watch my kid, then i won't bring her back!!!" so I (somehow, still calmly) say "that's fine, you aren't required to bring her back, but you are required to fulfill your contract, pay 1 months tuition in place of notice, pay for the week you missed last week, and for the day your daughter was here this week, I won't charge you for this week since this she was only here one day, and we'll part ways" she screams into the phone "you won't get a dime from me again EVER" to which I reply "then it's time for you to come pick up your child, have a good day" and I hang up. Her husband comes to get the baby and apologizes about a hundred times, his wife is blowing up my phone every 10 minutes and i finally just ignore her calls and she stops.
I send her an email, ignoring her psychosis and just stating what she owes me, the amount was $590 but I removed $250 because she had prepaid $650 back in October because her dad gave her money, and instead of paying $120 a week, she had been paying $70, and $50 of the prepaid amount was being applied to her bill weekly, well she still had a balance of $250 on her account so I applied that to what she owed, making the final balance $240, I told her she had a week to pay it, if payment wasn't made in full after a week, a fee of $5 a day would accrue on her account. She wrote back that I owed HER $400, because she wasn't paying a cancelation fee because she didn't break her contract because i told her to come get her kid, and that she had $400 in her account not $250, and I owed her $20 for a brand new box of diapers (even though everyone here takes turns buying diapers and wipes) and that i had 24 hours to drop off her daughters onesie and sippy cup or she was filing a police report because if i don't bring her stuff to her then that means i stole it. Oh, and that she hired an attorney because she was never given a copy of her contract so she didn't know what it said. Well, she was given a copy of her contract, she signed, initialed, and dated that she was given a copy, and she signed, initialed, and dated that she received a copy of her handbook that spells out in very simple terms all of my policies regarding supplies, termination, late payments, etc...but for good measure i sent her copies of those too.
Ok, I think we can all agree that no attorney is getting involved in something that is under $500, so I wrote back that I was done communicating through email, she had her say, I had mine, it was finished, that she should expect a package that required signature confirmation, I listed out everything that was included in the package, and I was done.
That's when she started calling again, calling after 10 pm to wake up my kids, calling when I was a church leaving voicemails that she's sitting in my driveway, threatening me, etc...she's a basket case
Well, she refused the certified package twice so it's coming back to me, so I'm going to keep this one for court, it's sealed and the judge can open it for themselves to see what i had originally sent her, that she refused, and I'll make another package and send it to her business, she's an owner so it isn't like she can claim that i was putting her business out there to her boss or something...I hate that I'm going to have to go to small claims but I'm confident I'll win. When it's all said and done, with late fees, lost wages, and filing costs, she's going to owe me nearly $700. I told her I would be filing in small claims on 1/17/11, roughly 30 days after her late fees kicked in. I was told that if I wait too long, the judge will put a cap on how much I can charge for late fees.
Just thought I would share my horror story with everyone, and I'm curious as to how others would handle this situation, it's by far the worst experience I've ever had in daycare!
Well, this parent decided that if I closed daycare during Thanksgiving week, then she would just extend her stay at her moms for an additional week. I explained that daycare was open bright and early Monday morning, everyone else showed up, she could have too, but she made the decision not to, that's on her not me.
So, December 7th she drops her kid off, and again doesnt pay! Her husband picks their daughter up that night and he speaks NO english so it isn't worth discussing with him IMO so the next morning, hubby drops their daughter off again. So now I see what's going on here, she's sending her non english speaking husband to drop off/pick up knowing that I can't discuss payment with him. Well, that didn't stop me, I was like "your wife has not been paying me to keep your daughter. I need to be paid or else I can't keep watching her" so he says "ok i tell her"...but he doesn't go for his wallet to pay me, which further annoyed me....but i'm like he might not have even understood what i meant, i'll call her during her lunch break.
Well, 10 minutes later I get a call from her and she is LIVID, screaming at me about how dare i discuss her business with her husband (um, what?) and that she would bring me my #^&!^ money and our friendship was over, blah blah blah...so I'm still calm, I'm like "I don't have a personal issue with you, I just want to be paid for my services, I watch your daughter 55+ hours a week, all I ask is to be paid on time" she *loses her mind* and starts screaming and swearing again "oh so now i'm a bad mother, you have to watch my kid to much, if it's too much for you to watch my kid, then i won't bring her back!!!" so I (somehow, still calmly) say "that's fine, you aren't required to bring her back, but you are required to fulfill your contract, pay 1 months tuition in place of notice, pay for the week you missed last week, and for the day your daughter was here this week, I won't charge you for this week since this she was only here one day, and we'll part ways" she screams into the phone "you won't get a dime from me again EVER" to which I reply "then it's time for you to come pick up your child, have a good day" and I hang up. Her husband comes to get the baby and apologizes about a hundred times, his wife is blowing up my phone every 10 minutes and i finally just ignore her calls and she stops.
I send her an email, ignoring her psychosis and just stating what she owes me, the amount was $590 but I removed $250 because she had prepaid $650 back in October because her dad gave her money, and instead of paying $120 a week, she had been paying $70, and $50 of the prepaid amount was being applied to her bill weekly, well she still had a balance of $250 on her account so I applied that to what she owed, making the final balance $240, I told her she had a week to pay it, if payment wasn't made in full after a week, a fee of $5 a day would accrue on her account. She wrote back that I owed HER $400, because she wasn't paying a cancelation fee because she didn't break her contract because i told her to come get her kid, and that she had $400 in her account not $250, and I owed her $20 for a brand new box of diapers (even though everyone here takes turns buying diapers and wipes) and that i had 24 hours to drop off her daughters onesie and sippy cup or she was filing a police report because if i don't bring her stuff to her then that means i stole it. Oh, and that she hired an attorney because she was never given a copy of her contract so she didn't know what it said. Well, she was given a copy of her contract, she signed, initialed, and dated that she was given a copy, and she signed, initialed, and dated that she received a copy of her handbook that spells out in very simple terms all of my policies regarding supplies, termination, late payments, etc...but for good measure i sent her copies of those too.
Ok, I think we can all agree that no attorney is getting involved in something that is under $500, so I wrote back that I was done communicating through email, she had her say, I had mine, it was finished, that she should expect a package that required signature confirmation, I listed out everything that was included in the package, and I was done.
That's when she started calling again, calling after 10 pm to wake up my kids, calling when I was a church leaving voicemails that she's sitting in my driveway, threatening me, etc...she's a basket case
Well, she refused the certified package twice so it's coming back to me, so I'm going to keep this one for court, it's sealed and the judge can open it for themselves to see what i had originally sent her, that she refused, and I'll make another package and send it to her business, she's an owner so it isn't like she can claim that i was putting her business out there to her boss or something...I hate that I'm going to have to go to small claims but I'm confident I'll win. When it's all said and done, with late fees, lost wages, and filing costs, she's going to owe me nearly $700. I told her I would be filing in small claims on 1/17/11, roughly 30 days after her late fees kicked in. I was told that if I wait too long, the judge will put a cap on how much I can charge for late fees.
Just thought I would share my horror story with everyone, and I'm curious as to how others would handle this situation, it's by far the worst experience I've ever had in daycare!
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