EmChalke's Reviews
Childminder
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Average Rating:
(4.78 from 23 reviews)
Emma has been our childminder for the past 6 years. She has looked after all three of my children. My youngest is 2 and my 2 older children are still cared for by her in their school holidays and look forward to their time with her.
I can honestly and openly state that she has been brilliant.
I would not leave my children with someone who I thought did not have my children's welfare as their first priority.
Being a working Mum is tough and there is always some kind of guilt to deal with but Emma makes life easier by being honest, friendly, helpful and flexible, entirely professional and always happy to accommodate our childcare needs. I have never had an issue with fees or her time keeping.
Emma and her whole family have become our friends over the years. Her children are friendly and polite as is her husband. She also has a lovely friendly collie dog!
The bottom line is that I would not fail to hesitate to recommend Emma as a childminder. I know that the children in her care are happy,safe and well looked after.
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My two children have been with Emma for 3 and half years now. I have found Emma's whole family to be welcoming to my children, myself and my husband. I find Emma approachable and honest, any issues ( of which there have only been two) have been addressed and resolved quickly with a happy resolution for both parties.
Emma is highly thought of by children and parents alike, and comes highly recommended. This was evident to see when seeing Emma with the first ever child she looked after - who now has a child of her own. The children all play well together and have a variety of activites to do after school. Throughout the holidays they have days out, and my children always enjoy there time there.
Emma will always contact me straight away if there is anything she feels I need to know about my children and I trust her 100% with my children
When I asked my children for three words to describe emma without hesitation they both said - nice, fair, and thoughtful.
Emma accepts child care vouchers which are offered by most employers. As there is a slight delay in the vouchers being transferred to cash, I have arranged for Emma to bill me in time so she is paid by the end of the month.
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Emma was my sons childminder for 8 1/2 years and I was very happy with her. I chose Emma because she provided a home from home setting for my son while I was at work.
My son has special needs and she was very supportive of him and myself during and after the diagnosis process. If there were any concerns she had with my son, she would always talk to me in private and we would sort it out together.
My son loved going to Emma and would even ask to go there during the summer holidays when I wasn't working!
Emma has a lovely house and garden and her family are very friendly. There is a real fun / family atmosphere at her house which was very important to me when I was looking for a childminder. Her older boys set a good hard working example for my son and her husband was always welcoming and friendly.
Emma always got my son to school on time and she was never late picking him up.
When my son started a new secondary school, he needed to catch a coach. I would therefore put him on the coach in the morning and he would then meet Emma after school. This obviously reduced the amount I was paying Emma but she was very supportive of the new arrangement. when my son became more independent, he didn't need to go to Emma but she was great and said that if the situation changed and we needed her support again, she would be happy to help.
My son is now 13 -yep, an uncommunicative teenage; but he will still make a beeline to Emma if we see her when we are out and about and has nothing but positive things to say about his time with Emma.
I would defiantly recommend Emma to anyone looking for a kind, honest and reliable childminder!
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I am writing a review as Emma was my childminder when I was attending secondary school. I started with Emma at the age of 11 we had just moved to Yateley I didn't know anyone at the school or in the local area. Emma made me feel nothing but welcome and helped me with my nerves when i started school. Also I became good friends with Emma's children and remain friends with them to this day. I thought it would be a good perspective to see things from the childs view rather than just a parents. I am now 19 years of age and I have lots of happy memories of the time I spent with Emma and her family. Emma's husband Matt was sometimes home from work before my mum collected me and he was always very kind and helpful. I took Childcare has an option at school and did my work placement with Emma because I think she was such a good example of a childminder. My brother also went to Emma's with me and again was very happy during his time there. I actually have a little girl of my own now, she is 3 months and I have taken her to meet Emma already. If I ever never need a childminder in the future for my daughter I would have no hesitation in using Emma. I highly recommend her!
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I feel strongly that I need to respond to a review that has been left on this website this week regarding Emma's care. Emma cared for both my children during their school years. My daughter was in Emma's care from the age of 11 until 15 and my son from the age of 6 until 13. I cannot stress enough how pleased I was with Emma's care for both my children during their time with her and my children were both extremely happy there. If I could address a couple of points that were spoken about in the previous review, firstly I completely disagree that Emma is motivated by money. Emma was always very relaxed regarding payments and I don't recall her ever once asking for payment early! There were certainly never any mistakes on invoices at any time. Emma clearly has a real love and passion for looking after children and I truly believe that is her motivation, both my children adored her and still do. I can also honestly say I never once had any problems with my children being late for school, they were both always on time. Also there were never any issues with my children being collected from school on time and they were never left in the playground last to be collected. My son was actually a very sensitive child while he was at primary school and he would have been devastated if this was the case and would of certainly have told me. Both my children never had any bullying problems with Emma's children, in fact they would still class them as friends. Emma's children were always polite and friendly and as for Emma's husband Matt having anger issues, this would almost be laughable if it wasn't so spiteful. He is possibly one of the most loving fathers I have ever met and is extremely placid and friendly at all times and I really do not believe that he would threaten violence to anyone. I have never witnessed any type of anger from him and again both my children thought the world of him. To sum up I would highly recommend Emma to anyone who wishes for a caring and homely enviorment for their children. Emma not only looked after my children after school but also in the school holidays as my children enjoyed going there so much. And she always was wiling to help at short notice if I needed help with childcare. I am astonished by the bad review on this site and find it very spiteful. I would only ask that you at least go to Emma's home and see for yourself what a friendly and loving environment it is. In fact my daughter was so fond of Emma and her children she still visits them now.
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Hi
I feel the need to write another review about Emma as I have just read a review which I believe is untrue. My daughter has been going to Emma's now for 3 years and she has never once been late for school or been picked up late, in fact I pick up twice a week and get there very early and I always see Emma before the kids come out! My daughter had a couple of issues early on with a couple of children at Emma's but when I addressed Emma she dealt with them in a very timely professional manner. This included a small issue I had with her own daughter which I may add (girls of a similar age will fall out now and then) but Emma dealt with it quickly and and again professionally. As for money, yes Emma sends a text the week before payment is due but that's just for a heads up and not a request for it there and then. Emma works in full weeks so she does know what the bill will be. I don't get paid until the day before last of the month and I have never been hassled for money early, in fact the month I thought I had paid and hadn't Emma didn't say anything for about 3 days bless her. Once maybe twice I have had to query my bill and both times I have been wrong so as far as I am aware I have never been over charged for anything. I have never questioned Emma's care for my daughter and while I was off sick for 6 months she was as helpful as she could be by coming to collect Lily and dropping her off as I couldn't drive. My daughter spends all day at Emma's in the school holidays and they do lots, Emma never stays in if the weather is nice, she gets the. Kids out to the airfield or local parks, Sandhurst park, Dinton pastures, Frimley lodge, farms. She also has art and craft set up at home, hamma beads, making soaps or baking and always makes sure the kids have loads to do if stuck indoors. As for Emma's husband I have always found him very pleasant and have often sat chatting to him when I've turned up early and Emma isn't quite back from the school run. I've never seen him shout or be aggressive to anyone. I've always found Emma's older children to be very friendly and have sat chatting to them too when I've been early. If I was reading reviews on Emma I would totally say please ignore the one bad one as I believe it was written for all the wrong reasons. If I thought for one minute that Emma wasn't taking proper care of my daughter or that she was being bullied or bored while in Emma's care there is no way I would still have her there 3 years later as my daughter is my first and only priority. It is difficult when making a decision on who will care for your child when you are working and I looked at a few when I had to change 3 years ago and Emma was never a doubt.
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I have employed Emma as a childminder for approximately 6 years and until about a year ago when things first started to adrift I would (and had left) a good review. However I have decided to leave and honest and frank review of Emma for the information of other parents. Emma had in the past been good (improvements were needed). However Emma’s behaviour and professionalism has steadily got worse over a relatively short period of time. I have broken down my review in to the elements that most parents look at when considering a childminder:
Childcare
Emma’s priority is not the welfare of the children in her care, it is for her to make as much money as she can under any means (I will provide more detail on this shortly). I had paid Emma to do the school run, term time only. I would often get text messages and phone calls from the school to say that my child was late to school. Emma’s never gave a satisfactory response to this, rather just made excuses. Emma in my opinion is extremely disorganised due to the sheer number of children she attempts to look after. I was then contacted by the school to state that Emma never picked my child up from school on time, he was more often than not one of the last children left in the playground (and was often left standing alone in bad weather), because Emma could not organise herself properly. This is a serious safeguarding issue that so far Emma has refused to resolve. There is no structure to the care Emma’s care and the children are simply left to get on with it. There have been issues of bullying between the children which Emma does not deal with as it involves her own children, which leads to the smaller children becoming very upset. I recently had a terrible experience with Emma’s husband (who is regularly in the house when the children are there) who clearly has anger issues and became very aggressive and abusive towards me (which included making threats of physical violence against me), this terrified my child, the other children who were witness to it and myself, Emma did nothing to stop the situation and protect the children in her care. Any concerns you raise with Emma she will simply ignore completely or involve her aggressive husband to bully and intimate you into silence. Emma’s reaction to me raising concerns about the safe-guarding issues was to stop speaking to my child altogether whilst he was in her care, and have him standing by the door when I came to collect, and ushered him out the door and then to slam the door in my face (I was not even allowed to ask how my child was in her care). Luckily my child is old enough to tell me what had been happening. If this was a small child who was unable to communicate you might never know the extent of their unhappiness.
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Emma is solely motivated by money, and shortly after signing the contract I was constantly harassed by her trying to increase fees and change the terms of the contract to get as much money as she possibly could, it became exhausting trying to manage this. Fees were due at the end of the working month / beginning of the following month as per her own contract, however Emma would constantly be asking for money early (she would bill me as early as the 18th of the month – bearing in mind our contract was that fees were only due for the days my child was in her care so she wouldn’t know what the rest of the month would look like) so would then start asking for money. In the approx. 6 years every bill was paid early or on time, but Emma’s constant demand for money early made it clear to me there were financial issues. Emma would also regularly overcharge and when you challenged her to say the bill wasn’t right, would reply with ‘my maths isn’t very good’, I never received an apology for this. I only started checking the bills about 12 months ago, and every single one I checked was wrong and she had tried to significantly overcharge. I am in no doubt this pattern had been going on for much longer.
Leaving your child with a stranger as a working parent is the hardest thing you will ever have to do. My advice after employing childminders for over 8 years is to interview as many as you possibly can and make an informed decision from there. There are lots of very good childminders in Yateley. However my personal advice would be not to include Emma in your interviews as in my opinion the care and environment she provides is not adequate and I have found her to be very unprofessional.
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by
Parent
about
EmChalke
on 30/06/2016
Response by
EmChalke
on 02/07/2016:
I have to say sadly im not surprised at this review left by this parent as she does have issues ,so I do have sympathy for her, but it saddens and upsets me that after all the years Ive cared for her son she feels the need to make up so many blantant lies about me and all my family. Up until very recently she would have said her son was so happy and as she said wrote a lovely review on here about me, but then her husband started doing building work for us, which was a big mistake and we have had many big problems wit having to have a lot of the work redone by other builders and sadly this is where all this anger and lies have come from. Its all untrue, the welfare of the children in my care is my upmost priority as any of my parents will agree. Im never late for school, either drop off or collection at the schools I attend, and as for just being motivated by money, that's so untrue, I just like to be paid every month, on time, like everyone else that works for a living!
I have been childminding for 18 years now and I still have great relationships with previous parents from the past up to present day, all my children and parents know all my family ,including my husband, and will be happy to clarify that he is the most placid of men you will meet!
There are many other things I could write on here about the parent , but I wont as Im not like that, all I will say is this review is as untrue as you can possibly get, and she obviously feels the need to try and ruin my reputation out of spite, so I would just ask that any parent looking for childcare to read my other reviews and discard this one as it really is all lies, written out of spitefulness and all because we fell out over building work, nothing to do with the care of a child at all!!
Emma is a wonderful , extremely experienced , caring , kind , highly efficient and very flexible childminder . Emma looked after my preschool aged son and was very flexible to accommodate my shift work , and early morning starts which is hard to come by .Emmas childcare setting is lovely and very spacious .Emma frequently takes her mindees to different parks , farms and to soft play which my son really enjoyed
Occasionally Ollie stayed over night and was very happy doing this , and felt like one of the family !
I very highly recommend Emma for anyone looking for childcare
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Emma is very flexible and provides a warm loving environment for children to play. I chose Emma to care for my 15 month old son because I feet she has a laid back relaxed home where nothing is a problem or a stress and children are free to play and enjoy themselves. My son suffers with Breath Holding Spells and I noticed that these became less frequent after I moved him from a nursery into Emma's care. He really enjoyed his time at Emma's house and we will miss her greatly. Its unfortunate that we are moving so far away otherwise I would continue with Emma until my son was ready for school.
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What an amazing find Emma has been, when my last childminder had to give up her post after looking after my daughter Lily for 4 and a half years I wasnt sure what to do but Emma is a fantastic replacement. She has looked after Lily for 8 months now and Lily couldn't be happier. Emma is warm and caring, very welcoming and her house is a myriad of things for kids to do. They have lots of room inside and out to play and just be kids. Emma's own children are nothing but polite and couteous and Lily has fitted in really well. I would highly recommend Emma to anyone looking for a childminder in Yateley.
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