Owners bully parents

My son went to Nightingale day care in New Germany, Durban from the beginning of 2016. At the beginning of October 2016, I spoke to Nicky, the owner, telling her that I am putting in a notice to take my son out at the end of December 2016. I told her he was to go and stay with my mom for 6 months so he could learn Zulu. She told me that the notice period goes till the end of February 2017, not December 2016. I didn’t argue with her and I kept my son there till the end of Feb ’17, two months longer than I anticipated.

On the 4th September 2017, I made a mistake and deposited money into nightingale’s account, meaning to deposit it into his new school’s account. I realised this mistake a month later when I received a statement from this school that I was now behind in payment by R2000. When I investigated my payments, I realised that this was because I put money into nightingale’s account.

On the 31st of October 2017 I e-mailed Nicky to ask that they refund me. Neither Nicky nor Clifford  responded at all.

On the 9th of November, I went to nightingale and spoke to Nicky. Firstly she told me she didn’t respond to my mail because her e-mail address was hacked. She had been receiving a lot of spam including ****ographic content, so she had her account sent to someone to have it fixed. She told me Clifford didn’t refund because maybe he thought 6 months was over and I was bringing Nkazimulo back into the school. I told her this was not the case, I had made a mistake.

She then gave me her personal e-mail address for me to send her the proof of payment for that deposit as well as my banking details, which I did.

They still didn’t respond to my e-mail. On the 16th of January 2018, I sent a whatsapp message to Nicky asking her to refund my money as I needed it. She never responded to me but Clifford did, saying they will not refund me, claiming I owe them since March 2017. He said I should have written a letter for the notice as stipulated in the contract I signed if I wanted to take my child out. I told him the verbal agreement I had with Nicky was binding. And I told him that is the same reason why they had never notified nor pursued me for owing them anything.

On the same day (16th January 2018)  I lodged a claim against nightingale with a consumer council. Then on the 22nd I received a message from  ********** ********** claiming that I am owe nightingale R18,000.

The only reason Nicky and Clifford now want me to think I owe them money, is because they don’t want to refund my R2000. I cannot believe they are bullying me into not paying back my money.

 I do not owe them anything….I served the longest notice period in my life and now they claim I dishonoured the contract, they are pulling this stunt because they are bullies and thieves.

 Regards Bathabile Mpofu New Germany, Durban.