I see no problems with a fee. I wish my school charged one. You have no idea how terrible it is to sit with a child after school for hours trying to get ahold of someone to come pick them up. If there are extenuating circumstances, then fine. But most the time they come up and say oh I lost track of time, or I took a nap and didn’t wake up, or some other absolutely ridiculous excuse. Maybe if there were some consequences this would not happen as much.

Great way to avoid having to pay this fee: pick your kid up on time, and if you can’t, designate someone else to do it!

Our preschool has a $15.00 charge if you’re ten minutes late (or more). I didn’t know it was uncommon practice. (I’m new to all of this!) That said, we weren’t late at all last year. I hope not to be this year. :)

My wife is a Kindergarten teacher. At her former school, there was an aftercare program that parents paid for daily if the child stayed late. If any students were left after dismissal they would go to the aftercare room. It would be unfair to those parents who pay for aftercare if some students were allowed to be in aftercare for free. Long and the short of it: if you don’t want to pay, get there on time!

What a sad commentary on our society that ‘parents’ can’t be troubled to care for their children. I feel for the teachers. On one hand, I can remember teachers staying with kids who wouldn’t dream of charging the parent for being late. On the other hand, these days this kind hearted courtesy becomes abused. The truth is, we all lose in this situation.

Interestingly, this apparently has been known to backfire if the fees aren’t high enough – it was written about in Freakonomics, where day care centers instituting a fee actually had late pickups INCREASE, because the social shaming of seeming like a bad parent for picking up late went away once it turned into a purely mercenary transaction. Parents then could feel like they were entitled to make the choice to trade an extra 20 minutes of work for whatever the fee was. I found a link to the chapter here: http://ec1.images-amazon.com/media/i3d/01/A/wia_migrate/freakonomics-first-chapter.pdf – Really interesting stuff!

If I were the teacher making $1/minute, I MIGHT think that the pain was worth it. The cash should be handed over to the teacher in charge immediately! =)

(And, no, I’m not trying to say that teachers should just suck it up, just trying to add some levity. I agree with the above comments: Parents need to get their kids on time!)

I don’t think a fee is harsh.

On one hand, I think the fees are completely reasonable. On the other hand, I’ve also seen the backfiring firsthand. I work at a private preschool, which charges $1/min, payable directly to the staff member present, for failing to pick children up by the end of aftercare. The staffers will let a parent off the hook if it’s a one-time thing, but I’ve seen a family or two that just seem to accept the extra $10-15 as part of their daily expenses. It’s immensely frustrating for the staff.

Bekka- I just finished Freakonomics and was thinking the same thing as I read this article. SOcial consequences seem to have more of an impact than financial ones. I wonder what the fee would have to be to make it as much of a disincentive as the social cost. I think what Kikiriki described would probably do it!

Here’s another solution: When I was a middle school track coach, a male colleague of mine was left with a female student an hour after practice had ended. Neither of her parents were answering their cell phones. Rather than risking the liability of being alone with a student of the opposite sex, the coach called the police and asked for an officer to come to the school and wait with them. The parents finally arrived and found their daughter sitting on the bleachers between a coach and a cop. Word spread quickly, and that was the last time we ever had a parent late for pick-up.

Comments I would be thrilled if I had to pay a fee because I wasn’t there to take my daughter off the bus which dropped her off in front of our house. On day, I sat on the couch for “just a minute!” and fell asleep for 3 hours. The bus driver was banging on my door, calling my house phone and cell phone and I slept through it all. My daughter was brought back to the school and the principal started calling house/cell phone and again no answer. They finally called my in-laws and they came and picked her up. The principal didn’t fine me he reported me to the Dept. of Children & Families for neglect! I was contacted by DCF & was asked to explain what happened. I explained exactly what happened, “an honest mistake” but they are still deciding if they are going to pursue and open the case! I am beside myself! I do not neglect my daughter in anyway and I am livid about this report. It’s a little much dont you agree, isn’t that why we fill out an EMERGENCY CONTACT form listing at least 5 people to call in instances like this one? Well, after two hours of trying to get me to answer the phone, he finally called my in-laws (fourth on the list) & they picked her up. He never even called my husband? Everyone claims that they were really worried about me that I was safe! If they were really worried about ME shouldn’t they have called my husband within the first hour? Then after TWO hours they decide to call for backup and then file an abuse/neglect report with DCF. If DCF decides to open a case against me, this could really really turn out to be worse than my worse nightmare. I need advise on what to do? Or has anyone ever been in a similar situation?