It’s the final week of “where are you now?” season at Ask a Manager, with updates from people who had their letters here answered in the past.
Remember the letter-writer who gave notice to their daycare provider and she freaked out? Here’s the update.
I wrote in about two and a half years ago about an issue we were having with our daughter’s daycare provider as we were moving on to a new daycare. You and your readers offered such kind and helpful advice. Here’s an update that includes a few interesting coincidences and plot twists.
We ended up getting to keep our child in Amy’s daycare for the full six weeks that followed our notice, just like Amy’s contract specified. Amy was still pretty cold with me, but she started to communicate with me again whenever there was a need related to my daughter. A few commenters were shocked that I wanted to continue sending my daughter to her after the unhinged text message, but I didn’t have much of a choice. My spouse and I had burned through our vacation time already while trying to cover all of Amy’s time off. I wasn’t really worried about Amy’s ability to continue caring for my daughter well. She’s a really nice person and she cared so deeply for the kids she was entrusted with, I still felt like I could trust her to do her job well. She did nickel and dime us a bit when I wrote her our last check. She counted back the number of days since we gave notice and claimed that because we told her we were ending care after 5 pm that that day didn’t count toward the six weeks notice in her contract. I didn’t argue with her and paid her for an extra day of care we didn’t receive. Oh well.
Here’s where things get a little more interesting. A couple of months later, we found out that the reason we were able to ride out the last six weeks of care was because the other family who was going to take our daughter’s spot backed out. It turns out that that child’s grandmother is a teacher at my daughter’s new daycare center, and she’s been teaching there for 20 years! The other family was just waiting for a spot to open at the center, and when one did they didn’t need Amy anymore. I guess things worked out for them too. In the end, it was actually pretty lucky that we left Amy’s daycare. She retired about a year later, and she gave her remaining families very little notice, so they scrambled to find new care. One parent who I see occasionally at my daughter’s dance class told me she had to split her three kids up at three different daycares in our town. The daycare shortage is awful in our area.
Ultimately, I didn’t end up writing a Google review or reaching out to any other parents at the time. Over the past couple of years, I have been in conversations with other parents where this story has come up and I’ve shared some details, but it’s never been my intention to bash Amy. I’m now very glad that I didn’t start a PR rampage because Amy is in our lives again; she organizes the Sunday school program our daughter is in at our church so we have to talk to her occasionally. She’s really nice to us, and we’ve been able to move past our past issues.
We’ve also added another daughter to our family in the last few months. Luckily, she was able to get a spot at the daycare center we’ve come to love over the last few years. Thanks again for the advice!