I know not everyone has the ability to leave their jobs at the drop of a hat but for goodness sake, how about communicating this better with you. She should have kept you informed of when she or someone else would be collecting the child. I stipulate within 60 minutes a child must be picked up. In addition I have at least an additional 2 emergency contacts. I would have called after 1 hour not waited and also I wouldn't have texted. I would have had a conversation over the phone to make sure she was totally clear on how important it was for her to arrange pick up for her child and I would have reinforced at that time the importance of collecting the child quickly to prevent it from disrupting the rest of the day for the others. Texting is convenient for short, minor bits of info being passed back and forth but IMO illness is not something that should be dealt with over a text message as things get lost in translation and apparantly thats what happened as this mother didn't act appropriatly. Hopefully you can have a face to face conversation with these parents and get them on the same page incase this situation should arise again. If this clause isn't in your contract I would suggest sending home an amendment to your contract and have them sign it. If it is, then you should hand a copy to the parents and explain that you expect them to stick to your policies and make it quite clear to them the ramifications of their actions and how it effected everyone including their child, the other children and yourself.