This was going to be my response. Hell I don’t think all my lamps put together would amount to $80 to replace.
I don’t have toddlers anymore but when I did my place was baby proofed to the hilt. I could see if she did not have children of her own but since she does I would think her place would be set up for children.
Did the child escape the play room and break a lamp where the children are not usually allowed to stray? If so they I think that makes a difference. I think she needs to get more details.
Can the sitter prove the price of the lamp? If the thing was brand new I could see her wanting the full price but if the lamp was ten years old then not so much.
Of course it is all moot if she wants to keep the sitter and is willing to pay the $80 just to make it all go away. I know as a single mom it is not easy to find in home care that you can trust and you can afford.
Maybe they can come to an agreement to split the cost?
If the kid is a handful and prone to doing stuff like this I think I’d offer to pay half, mainly as a compromise to maintain the peace. Otherwise I think it shoud be expected that the baby sitter is responsible for controlling the child and the environment.
A broken lamp could result in a danger from cuts, to electric shock. A young child can’t be held negligent, but the care giver certainly can.
I think the liability rests w/ the care giver. My response would likely be to chastise her for allowing my child to be put in danger and I would find another care giver
When you have small kids in the house, you childproof. If you have an $80 lamp you give a damn about, you don’t leave it where the kids can get to it. Her own damn fault. Not to mention the safety issues.
If I were a childcare provider running an unlicensed daycare out of my house, I wouldn’t have the guts to ask a parent to pay for the lamp. It doesn’t take much around here to have social services come visit your house, fine you and shut you down until you get licensed (which is apparently a pain in the butt.)
Even in small claims court, you don’t get the total replacement cost for an item. You have to account for depreciation. So asking for $80 was out of line no matter whether she believed the kid was at fault.
But, as others have said, the friend should pay if she wants to keep the babysitter. I would definitely have a conversation with the lady to establish ground rules for the future. What if he had dripped something on the carpet – would she have expected her carpet to be replaced? What if he had flung a remote and broken the big screen t.v.?
“While I am certainly willing to contribute to the cost of replacing the lamp, part of me feels that some responsibility should clearly lie with the person who should have been watching the child, which, um, would be you. And a case could be made that things getting broken is part of the overhead when running a day care, formal or otherwise, in one’s home. Of course, if you feel very strongly about this, I will pay for it, and we can both move on. I just wanted an opportunity to voice my feelings on the matter, y’know, be heard?”
That is a very interesting and good question she should ask. What IF her child breaks her big screen tv? It seems pretty clear that this person would expect my friend to pay for that as well. The child isn’t particularly wild but kids play. I think I need to advise her to address this issue and come up with an agreement or she may end up refurnishing this ladies home.
I have for years and still have an informal ‘daycare’ situation in my house and would not dream of charging for a broken item like a lamp. Also, I can’t imagine charging the full price of the lamp. ISTM that since the provider feels the need to charge, the best decision would be to share the cost of a reasonable replacement, or for your friend to bring a replacement item.
Spills, broken items, snacks eaten, toilet paper used, etc., to me, are part of the cost of providing the service.
What are the details of the incident? Did the item get broken solely by the one child? Was it an accident or did the child act deliberately? (A deliberate act would result in me not watching the kid. It’s my house, and I decide what kids I keep. I’ve bumped a couple of kids because they were too much trouble.)
It’s more likely 2 or 3 kids were playing in the area and the lamp was knocked over. Accidents happen and I don’t generally punish (or charge) for accidents. Elbows has the best advice on the discussion needed in this situation.
I’d add Lisa’s “I also need to understand how far my liability extends - should my child spill grape juice on the carpet, will I be replacing the carpets in your home?”
Have your friend consider very carefully the precedent she sets paying for the lamp and the answers she gets to these questions - cheap daycare isn’t cheap if she gets a $3,000 carpet bill or $600 for paint on the car where the trike has scraped up against it. Cheap daycare has even less value when a house isn’t childproofed properly or kids aren’t watched close enough and someone gets hurt.
(Though accidents happen, even well supervised and childproofed.)
I’m gonna add another vote for elbow’s approach. I can’t help but think this bill from the provider is a signal of things to come. At best, she should try to negotiate it down and work very hard to find another provider.
FWIW, I related this story to my kids’ daycare provider last night, and she said she’d never try to charge a parent for something a child broke - she feels that’s her responsibility. Of course, she’s also put right in the contract that she provides all toys for the kids, and if your kid brings a toy to daycare, she takes no responsibility if it is lost or broken.
I’d worry about the precedent about paying. If she does pay, she should make clear that it is a one time deal, and the child shouldn’t be able to break expensive items. Otherwise, next time babysitter is passed out on the couch with a bottle of ripple and the TV get’s broken, she’ll be expected to pay for that too.
Update: I phoned my friend earlier and asked her to check when she handed over the money today (gggrrrrr) if she IS responsible for anything that gets broken or damaged by her child when she is being watched by the daycare provider. She did so fifteen minutes ago. I was told the woman
was shocked by the question and responded…“Of course! If your child does the damage, you will have to pay for it.”
My friend is non confrontational and simply thanked her and left. I think she should find someone else because this may get ugly…especially if she is running a care center that the children have access to breakable items.
If the caregiver were to take her client to court (say the broken item was a $5K piece of art or something), how would she prove that it was this woman’s rugrat and not one of the 5 other rugrats who were cruising through the house? If I was the judge, I’d have to at least consider that one of the other children could have done it, or contributed in some way. This woman really needs a contract so the parents are informed up front about what the expectation is.
Mother did daycare 35 years ago like this lady. You do not ask for broken items to be replaced, without extreme cause. Like your kid freaked out because you put him on new medicine.
It sounds like this lady is wrong, but it sounds like your friend can’t afford to loose her. Not paying her off might be worse for her.
It really does depend for me on how the lamp got broken. Setting aside the fact that I agree with everyone who said there shouldn’t be $80 lamps where children play daily, three is old enough to obey when told “you may not climb on the table”. So, if children were playing all together and my son tripped, shook the table, lamp fell off and broke I would not expect to be billed. If the caregiver told my son 4 times not to play over there and then he went an whacked her lamp with a whiffle bat I would expect to pay.
I own a retail business, I have a play area near some seating for the loved ones of folks I’m actually waiting on. There are no breakable lamps but there are a few things around that could possibly be damaged. Except in the case of extreme and unmistakable willfulness I would never ever expect payment if a child damaged something.
I must have missed how the $80 was determined. Was she presented with the original receipt, or is that the cost of the lamp the babysitter picked out to replace the broken one?
So what happens when Child A of Customer A does something serious to Child B of Customer B? So who is at fault? Who pays? And how long after such an incident before child welfare is notified about this unlicensed and illegal child care facility?
Yes, child care is expensive. But at what cost at an unlicensed facility when something really bad happens?
Do you even know for sure this particular kid did the breaking? In any event I say no, unless the child did so maliciously. If he was in the designated play area and it was an accident from normal play, no. I don’t think regular daycare centers would charge for something like that- then again all the ones I’ve seen have tables chairs and toys only in the play area.
It would be interesting to have a talk with the other parents to ask if they’d received similar “bills.” She could be completely on the up-and-up with this incident being just an isolated thing, but it’s also possible that she’s using phony damages as a way of padding her income.
No matter what, $80 for a lamp is ridiculous, especially without a receipt.
On a related note, I’d probably ask the provider if she can’t deduct the price of the lamp on her taxes, then ask, “You do report the income from your daycare and pay taxes on it, don’t you?”
Giving this woman 80 dollars no questions asked is setting a bad precedent. Now she knows she can get away with extortion. Your friend should expect more of the same in the future.