Hollie's Reviews

Avoid

This childminder gave me a quote and then decided she would try and rip me off and bump up the price because she found out that i was looking for additional childcare on top of her. She has also been sat gossiping about me with her mate. Came to me throwing a tantrum because i was looking for additional childcare. Is coming across as very immature. The comments she made seemed like she was trying to intimidate me in some way or raise anxiety levels by letting me know i was being spoken about. Has lied here and proven she is not trustworthy. Completely avoid this person and find someone else. Not somebody you want looking after your children.

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by Hollie about GOLDSTAR on 07/08/2024

Not trustworthy

This child minder will share confidential information with her friends and gossip. Will lie about it and go to extremes to try and cover up wrongdoings and unfair treatment towards my family. You don't want someone like this watching your child.

I am forced to amend my review at this time as Bright Sparks has responded to my original with lies to make me look bad.

First off this is not an unfair review. It is accurate, based on my true experiences & can be shown with proof through messages. In these messages, Bright Sparks admits to discussing me with her friend. I have given neither permission to pass on information about me & anything on my family should be confidential. My family is vulnerable & doing so can put my family in danger!

This person’s friend already told me that she couldn't meet all of my needs. I also told her I would have preferred that I had one person doing all my son’s childcare. I also did not sign any contract or sign up with this person’s friend! As far as I was aware I had no Childminder! She was messing me around. My son, my son’s dad and myself didn't feel comfortable in her friend’s company & house either.

Bright Sparks has tried to put words in my mouth & tell me about my own experience when she wasn’t even there! Pretty much telling on herself.

Not once have I threatened or sent abuse to anybody. I have sent them both messages asking them to explain their actions and why they are treating my family the way they have. The only people who do not like being questioned here are them. Bright Sparks said she had nothing to do with this but then wrote a review on her friend's page to try & counteract my experience with her saying she was like family to her and tried to imply I was lying. She wasn't even there! This is her and her friend gossiping and quite frankly her response she has written has just shown how much they both are!
When Bright Sparks then got caught out in a lie she blocked me and made sure I couldn't put a review on anything. I also told them both they were getting reported for how they have treated my family as a childcare establishment. There have been no threats or abuse! They are trying to make me sound worse than what happened to make me look bad and to get my review gone. It’s bullying! They also got someone I don't even know to respond to my review. So I guess this is a third person both these people have passed stuff onto.

Her friend also tried to induce anxiety in me, came at me in a threatening manner & responded quite nastily to me when I said I didn't understand her. I have learning disabilities. I shouldn't be getting treated badly because I say I don't understand something. Learning disabilities aside, no one should! The way these two have treated me & still are has been disgusting. No apology or anything from either. Bright Sparks looked after my son twice I think. I had to leave my job unexpectedly due to issues at work & my health which was out of my control. I have been in and out of hospital now for 5 months. I can't give an accurate review on those days. My son was in her car for about 20 minutes both times but if I knew this is how she treated people before then I wouldn't have went with her to begin with. I should probably mention that Bright Sparks will speak badly about other Childminders in the area to make her services look better. Regardless of how these two have tried to make things in my life more difficult at this time, I do have other childcare in place now that I can trust.

After speaking to the police and reporting this whole issue and the Childminder myself I am now putting an update and addressing lies. The police themself can confirm I have sent no threatening and abusive messages. They also said It is within my right to write a review and also tell someone if I am reporting them. I have looked back at all messages
between myself and Bright Sparks. She recommended me this Childminder in August 2023 and it is now August 2024. So I highly doubt she was waiting for me to contact her. Before this situation, it was a while before we spoke and she didn't recommend her for the childcare that I needed at this
time. This can be proven by texts between us. The other Childminder contacted me on this website on her own accord not knowing who I was. The unsocial hours she is speaking about is working until 6:10pm twice on weekdays. Only having my son for 20 minutes each time. I was only just
getting back to work after leaving a relationship. So it was the Jobcentre who actually paid my start up fees for this childcare. She had actually been paid for all the childcare I needed up to my first pay day which roughly worked out at around two weeks. She was only required for two days
of that so she got paid for days she didn't work. The fact she would come to me and offer services for childcare then try and use them against me in a guiltrip because I told her she has done something wrong says it all. My original review states she is sharing confidential information about my family and trying to cover it up. Her response is sharing personal
information about my family, our contract etc again without my consent and is just further evidence for the report I have put in. I have her blocked on here, as well as from my phone and social media. In fact I did this on the same day I pulled her up about these issues and somehow she is still managing to view my profile on here daily. Sometimes a couple times a day.
Along with her friends viewing it as well. As far as I'm concerned she can now get people to review her services to make sure my review isn't really seen all she wants. It doesn't hide the fact she has done what she has done
and her whole reaction to it all is weird. At the end of the day a person can be the nicest person in the world if they are getting money from them!
Money seems to be most important here and not how she is treating other people. I will not be tolerating anymore intimidation in order to cause fear and anxiety. There will be no further correspondence from myself. My review is staying up. The police have said if she doesn't leave me alone
then to go back to them!

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by Hollie about Bright Sparks on 07/08/2024

Response by Bright Sparks on 11/08/2024:

Dear Hollie,

I find myself absolutely shocked and disgusted that I would need to respond to an unfounded and unfair review such as this. As I tried to explain to your many threatening Whatsapp messages before being forced to block you, I have not shared any information or gossiped about you at all. The "Friend" that you refer to is a fellow childminder, and is in fact my own son's childminder, who recognised your child's name as the child who was with me briefly previously. So this childminder knew that you had been with me previously which was nothing to do with me. The issue here is that after agreeing to go with this other (my son's) childminder, that I recommended to you and let her know that you might be in touch, you then, 1 week before starting with her, proceeded to contact other local childminders looking for the same days (not alternative as you claim on the other unfounded and unfair review you gave the other childminder). Thinking they were helping you, and with your permission, one of these childminders shared your enquiry on our local childminders Whatsapp chat, which is how it was known that you were shopping around after committing to someone else. Just for reference, it is not good form to sign up to 1 childminder then try to find another without at least letting the place go and allowing that childminder to replace you. You were unhappy about being asked about this by the other childminder, who quite within their right, was seeking clarification on your intentions and advised you they were aware you were shopping around and had also been with me previously briefly, so were looking to confirm if you still wanted the space. You then proceeded to threaten and abuse us both with nasty messages, refusing to listen to the truth and instead fueling your own jumped to, wrong conclusions.

It's unfortunate that after only using my services for a couple of drop offs and not actual childcare sessions, you felt the need to trash my reputation when I have done nothing but help you, firstly accommodating unsocial hours for your circumstances to then change within that week, and including since you stopped using my service, recommended 2 other childminders including a Saturday one, whose number I even sent you while away in Greece on leave at my sister's wedding. I have reached out to this site to ensure that this review is removed and am only responding so that anyone who sees this in the meantime, knows that this is the result of a malicious and unfounded attack against myself.

Bright Sparks Childminding