Creche loyalty contract

Hi,
we are placing our 6 month old daughter in a well known award winning creche in Lucan on Monday. We received the last of the paperwork this week and I've noticed a clause on the contract that states that if we take out our child after the 6 week probation period prior to her second birthday (bascially like a two year contract) we are liable for a penalty of one month's fees. This seems excessive and as they never informed us of this in their information booklets before leaves us in a no win situation as we do not have any alternatives right now.

Has anyone any experience with this? Do they hold people to this penalty or is it just a ploy to scare people off. They explain it with the statement that infant's cost more money so they recoup from subsequent years but its not like they aren't charging an arm and a leg anyways. I mean what happens if one of us gets made redundant, are they going to chase me through the courts for a grand.

It seems unreasonable to expect such a long commitment, most Créches only require a 1 month period of notice, plus Parents tend to only move their Children from their Childcare providers either due to changes in their circumstance or because they are unhappy with the service and neither of those situations can be anticipated so far in advance. I imagine they charge substancial fees anyway? Have you looked at others in the area to compare fees (I know your initial decision was probably on the quality of Childcare) to see if they are in fact offering a lower price for the early years?

We had our child in a well known creche in Lucan and had to take him out after 6 months (nothing to do with the creche) and once we gave a month's notice there was no penalty and we received our deposit back.

I recently received a flyer from the same chain of creches and they were offering €500 of first month's fees but there were terms and conditions - maybe this was one of them?

Is this a make-or-break issue for you? If so, tell them that you just not prepared to sign up for this, and be ready to walk away.

I can't walk away. We are blow ins so have no family living in dublin. Who will look after the child when my wife goes to work on monday.

Update. The creche's head office say they have never seen the clause be enforced so we will go ahead. Seems silly to have it in sign up document in that case.

Deisce said:

Update. The creche's head office say they have never seen the clause be enforced so we will go ahead. Seems silly to have it in sign up document in that case.

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While it's not quite the same thing, there are a lot of people in big trouble with bank/mortgage/property contracts with clauses that they never expected to be enforced!

I'd suggest you shop around for other creches in the area during the probation period. If you find another creche where you are happy with the care/price, you can play one off against the other to get the contract conditions that suit you. You may well find that in the current economic environment, they need you just as much as you need them.

How about you sign the contract but cross out (and sign)that clause and sign it then? If its never enforced they shouldn't have a problem with that!

Hi. I know what creche you are talking about. I used to work in one of the 2 in lucan. As far as i know, you pay the creche 6 months in advance for every 6 month period. If you take a baby out of creche before the 6 months is up you will not get any money back. That is why when babys are to leave they usually stay the full 6 months even if a parent has lost their job.