Allow staff to baby sit

[nomski100]

Do you allow staff to baby sit at weekends for children that attend your nursery?

Also I have a parent that has asked if the child’s key worker can take the child home( child’s home) after nursery finishes as mum is having an operation. I Have checked statutory guidelines and it does say if a child is not picked up you must not take them home but this would be an arranged dropping off. The member of staff is willing to do it but want to see if this is ‘against any rules’.

[SueFinanceManager]

Hi

I did a quick search and found this discussion but it dates from 2013 so things might have changed a bit, having said that it makes some very valid points and things to think about 

Sue

Admin Team

[AliceinWonderland]

I allow both of these, we have a babysitting policy and insist that parents read it before a staff member starts baby sitting and if a parent wishes a staff member to take their child home we get the permission in writing beforehand.

[MichelleGreenHR]

I agree, a robust babysitting policy would be very beneficial.

 

[finleysmaid]

they may not be insured for their car ??

[GFCCCC]

We don't allow either of these things, under any circumstances. We also don't allow any staff to keep their children in any of our settings and if a relative or friend of theirs brings their child to one of our settings, the staff member cannot work in the same room. 

 

[MarshaD]

I allowed a member of staff to do this a couple of years ago but I made it clear that any arrangements were privately between the two of them and entirely separate from the preschool.

[finleysmaid]

8 hours ago, GFCCCC said:

We don't allow either of these things, under any circumstances. We also don't allow any staff to keep their children in any of our settings and if a relative or friend of theirs brings their child to one of our settings, the staff member cannot work in the same room. 

 

interestingly i wonder if you can restrict this activity legally? would it not be restrictive practise in the eyes of the law?

[FSFRebecca]

2 hours ago, MarshaD said:

I allowed a member of staff to do this a couple of years ago but I made it clear that any arrangements were privately between the two of them and entirely separate from the preschool.

Yes, I agree. My concerns are always about the insurance - if a member of staff takes a child from nursery and they are wearing nursery uniform and they are going 'because they are the key person' I could see that someone might think that it was part of the nursery service. For me, I'd want the member of staff to change uniform before they left (if necessary) and I would ask for a disclaimer saying that the nursery holds no responsibility. For example, if there was a first aid issue that the member of staff dealt with badly and I had paid for the course I would want to be sure that there was no 'come back' on the nursery. I'm super cautious though 

 

[GFCCCC]

On 17/05/2018 at 07:38, finleysmaid said:

interestingly i wonder if you can restrict this activity legally? would it not be restrictive practise in the eyes of the law?

No it wouldn't be classed as restrictive practice at all, which refers usually to restricting practice to prevent competition or to reduce output - neither of these apply. Also, this is something that staff are aware of before they start and sign up to in the terms of their contract. This is about the effect it could have on the organisation if anything were to go wrong, because despite the fact that staff would not represent the organisation, it would be hard for anyone to separate the two. Also, it is about the pressure if would put staff under if they witnessed or heard anything in the home of a setting user, which caused them concern as they would be duty bound to report it and it could cause ill feeling between organisation and users. 

[finleysmaid]

1 hour ago, GFCCCC said:

No it wouldn't be classed as restrictive practice at all, which refers usually to restricting practice to prevent competition or to reduce output - neither of these apply. Also, this is something that staff are aware of before they start and sign up to in the terms of their contract. This is about the effect it could have on the organisation if anything were to go wrong, because despite the fact that staff would not represent the organisation, it would be hard for anyone to separate the two. Also, it is about the pressure if would put staff under if they witnessed or heard anything in the home of a setting user, which caused them concern as they would be duty bound to report it and it could cause ill feeling between organisation and users. 

It would be quite unusual in business to restrict what someone can do outside their job hours though...unless they were senior management or they were paid a great deal for their job. Would you restrict them from doing anything ? what about a bar job or cleaning or tutoring? I'm not sure in this day and age with the price of houses that we could say no to another position...especially in school holidays for instance.

[GFCCCC]

1 hour ago, finleysmaid said:

It would be quite unusual in business to restrict what someone can do outside their job hours though...unless they were senior management or they were paid a great deal for their job. Would you restrict them from doing anything ? what about a bar job or cleaning or tutoring? I'm not sure in this day and age with the price of houses that we could say no to another position...especially in school holidays for instance.

Absolutely not, many of our staff have part time jobs in bars or restaurants (I myself do other paid work outside of my role in the organisation) One or two of them even do babysitting jobs for an agency or for friends and family - I have no problem with this as it is totally unrelated to their role as a carer to that family within our setting. We just feel that it is very important  that nothing anyone does outside work could have any impact at all on the organisation. We also have some term time only staff who work in holiday schemes in their own child's school during the holidays and we have no problem with that either. And as I said, it is something that they choose to sign up to when they work for us.