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I have no advice to give because mines all pick up at the last minute. Even on their off days
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No. However, it's not unreasonable to expect parents to respect you and the other families you care for by picking up either before or after that 2-2.5 hour timeframe.
If they really can't avoid that 1pm DR appointment (or whatever), then fine, pick them up at noon and go to lunch together. Win-win.Comment
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So far, I haven't had to deal with this, except for one time and it was an unavoidable dr. appt. time. I woke the child up and she left, I also put her in a separate area that day so I wouldn't have to wake up the other kids. I do make it clear that I discourage drop offs and pick up during naptime and that they should be made with reasonable time before and after. I have younger kids so the parents are probably more in tune with how important naptime is.Comment
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If they give you enough warning, you could try simply saying "No, sorry, you know my policy on nap time pick ups. Either pick dck up before nap by 12:20 or after nap at 3:00."
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"I know I've mentioned this before, but nap time pick ups are very disruptive to the group, our routines and our schedule. If you'd like me to re-arrange our schedule to accommodate mid-day pick ups for you, I will need to increase your weekly fee to cover labor (which you mentioned you had an assistant) and switch break times. Is this something you think will continue?"Comment
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It might sound awful but sometime I simply ignore their messages for a good 20min or so. And I reply that I was busy and saw it was not an emergency so I had to care for the kids first.
In the beginning the parents would often showed up right in the middle of an activity or party or worse they would arrive before we opened and I made them wait for a while. Now that they had to wait so long they don't do it anymore!
Some parents would arrive 15min before we open and ring the bell non stop it would stress me out so much until I realized they are in the wrong not me and I would just let them ring the bell until it was exactly 8Comment
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In my state we can't tell them they can't pick up at naps, and I know of some providers who had to change their contracts if they had a "no nap time pick up" clause. technically any time a parent shows we have to give them their child.
But my policy is similar to another poster in that kids are napped and handed out the door to the parent. I will not keep kids up. I would be livid about the short notice though.Comment
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Our state regs have an open door policy written into them which roughly translates "No parent shall be denied access to their child when they show up at the most ridiculously inconvenient time of day."
If a parent showed up to pick up their child without warning, I would absolutely follow the law and allow access. But according to my surveyor I am allowed to strongly encourage parents to be respectful of naptime and choose to pick up before or after it.
I don't want to use termination as enforcement, nor do I now want to use a fee since that would still allow the behavior. It just has to stop, I'm literally at the end of my rope with these parents. It doesn't help that there's almost two dozen of them, so at any given day of the month one of them is bound to forget.Comment
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My door stays locked so if parents come at nap they have to text/call me to let them in. They remain in the foyer/entrance and I bring the child to them. They can see in my daycare room but we run a fan/sound machine/lullaby music so the noise isn't a factor for me. I don't necessarily tell them they can't come at nap But with the door locked they can't just barge in. I also have a sign I place on the door to "please enter quietly children are napping". My door remains locked throughout the day.
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I have had parents do this, but they gave me a heads up so I put them to sleep separately from the other kids. That worked fine. If they don't give me a heads up my door is locked so good luck. :-\Comment
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