A daycare center in Munich canceled a daycare place for a two-year-old boy because his parents did not agree to an increase in fees within four weeks. Now both parties have met again in front of the Munich I district court.
In March 2022, all parents of a daycare center in Munich’s Neuhausen district were informed that the contribution would increase from 1195 to 1231 euros. The price for a kindergarten place was also raised from 895 to 922 euros. Because the parents of a two-year-old forgot to agree to the fee increase, the facility vacated the child’s place and simply reallocated it. The letter expressly emphasized that approval must be given within one month.
Before the Munich I district court, the parents now testified that they had been extremely busy professionally. The placement of her child in the day care center had been planned long before the birth. “We chose our condominium because there is a daycare center around the corner,” said the father of the two-year-old boy to the “Süddeutsche Zeitung”. Accordingly, the boy felt very comfortable in the daycare center. A contract had already been concluded for the subsequent time in kindergarten, the father stated.
First, the parents wanted to clarify the matter with the responsible daycare managers. However, due to a corona case in the plaintiff’s family, a meeting never took place. “We didn’t want to quit,” the father wrote back to the Munich daycare center. They have always agreed to the price increase. “You can’t throw a child out just because an email hasn’t been answered,” said the father.
The head of the daycare center in Neuhausen, on the other hand, stated that the family did not feel comfortable there. “I thought they didn’t want any more space,” she said. Georg Werner, presiding judge, described the termination within three months as “possibly ineffective” – but only if the parents of the two-year-old had experienced “unreasonable disadvantage” as a result.
In the end, the judge made his position clear. Simply distributing the daycare place and interpreting the lack of parental consent as termination was not fair. “I have a problem with this behavior,” said Werner. Both sides negotiated “a regulation appropriate to the child’s well-being”, about which it was agreed not to disclose.
