Lollipops Petone

“I am heartbroken and very disappointed with this daycare. My 4-year-old daughter has been bitten multiple times while in their care — sometimes coming home with visible marks and tears on her face. The bite scars may stay with her for life. We have also had to sign 3–4 incident forms for hitting by other children (not accidents), but we never received any copies of those reports. When a more serious incident happened — where another child with sharp nails hurt our daughter — the daycare did not call or inform us, which is completely unacceptable. Despite informing the staff several times, the situation hasn’t improved, and I feel her safety has not been properly looked after. I do want to acknowledge one teacher, Kay, who is genuinely very kind and caring. She always tries her best, but it’s clear that she cannot manage all the children at the same time without additional support. As a parent, it’s very painful to see your child scared to go to daycare. Every child deserves to feel safe, cared for, and protected — unfortunately, that has not been our experience here. The best decision we made was to remove our daughter from this centre.”

“Our biggest regret. Will never ever recommend this centre to anyone. If you want your kids to look after themselves then enrol them here. Enrolled our girl and on her first day I walked in and she was crying to the point her eyes were puffy and the teacher was still continuing class and the others in the kitchen. When asked how long she had been crying for two teachers told me two different stories and that immediately made me question the values of this centre. When asked as well why no one called me they apologised and said ‘they didn’t think it was something we wanted as some parents don’t want to be contacted when their kids are unsettled’. Mind you this happened on her first day at school so of course we wanted a call if anything happened and they failed to do that. You lost my trust and you made her first day in care(or any care for that matter) one that was horrible and traumatic. You took that moment away from her and our family. Best decision was removing her from here. DO NOT LEAVE YOUR KIDS HERE!”

“The first thing you see on there website is “A childcare centre your family will love”. It gets better following further down, it mentions “OUR passionate & dedicated TEAM have created an ENGAGING, NURTURING SPACE” everything our niece did not receive on her FIRST day of daycare. Instead of engaging with her, you left her feeling isolated. Instead of creating a nurturing space, you left her out to cry in the corner alone with no comfort AT ALL. What gets me the most is no communication with her parents, not even a call. Again this is all on her first day. That definitely isn’t giving high quality care which you guys promote. I WOULDN’T RECOMMEND THIS PLACE FOR ANY KID! It’s sad to know that her new ventures as a big girl starting kindy ended up being her worst. VERY DISAPPOINTING!!!!”

“100% WOULD NOT RECOMMEND THIS DAYCARE CENTRE!!! To this day, I still have the image of my niece etched in my mind when we picked her up from her FIRST DAY of school at 3:30pm holding onto her water bottle, crying and calling out for her parents standing in the corner alone while a teacher with a group of kids nearby were seated on the ground carrying on with the class and going through story time. Such a traumatising experience! The different stories obtained from different teachers advising us ‘She’s been unsettled since you dropped her off’ to ‘Oh, she’s only been like that when she saw other kids getting picked up by their parents.’ You can see their stories do not align and we’re supposed to put our trust in them to take care of our little ones. This has definitely made us lose ALL trust in this daycare. We questioned why noone rang her parents or her emergency contacts listed but their response was they didn’t think we would’ve wanted to be contacted if she was unsettled as some parents prefer not to be contacted! THIS WAS HER FIRST DAY!🤯 I would not recommend enrolling your little ones here! This daycare does not provide the high quality care they rave about. There’s way too many kids for them to handle and not every kid receives the attention they deserve. They failed to make contact with the parents and/or emergency contacts to advise of my niece’s situation and that she’s unsettled. My niece cannot get her FIRST DAY of school back, what was meant to be a special milestone turned into our worst nightmare and you took that moment from her! Parents already have such a hard time parting ways with their little ones while they go back to the workforce and your daycare dropped the ball big time! What a shame! DO NOT ENROL YOUR KIDS HERE!!!”

“this is the second childcare place I've sent my 3 year old and it's the best by far. lollipops truly treats you like family. my daughter was very non verbal before attending lollipops and now she won't stop talking! my youngest son ended up in ICU in wellington at the start of the year and they wrapped their arms around us and gave us sooo much support! they checked in everyday with us to see how he was doing. I truly love lollipops so much! if I have more children they would be going to lollipops. the teachers are wonderful. so nurturing,loving and kind. thank you lollipops for the fantastic job you guys do.”