Social worker called mistakenly

Sunrise_Sunset

Weird thing happened today.
My husband is working from home, kids are on mid-term break, I headed off for the gym this morning.
When I got home there were 2 women sitting outside my house in a car, one was talking on the phone. I went into my house, and my eldest said that 2 women had been knocking on the door, then within a minute the doorbell rang. It was these 2 women. They asked me if X was home, I said no, no X lives here. I asked them what address they have and they said mine. I said I'm really sorry but there's no X here. Then one of them said oh I'm sorry if we frightened your kids earlier when we knocked. I said oh yeah they said someone was knocking. That was the end of it, and they went away.
About half an hour later the doorbell rang and it was one of these women again. I answered and she said sorry I called earlier to this address mistakenly, and I'm a social worker and I became concerned that your kids were here and there was no-one else here. I said, oh no, my hubbie was upstairs working and doesn't really answer the door (we get a lot of cold callers). I laughed it off, and she was fine with it and went on her way.
I then recounted the story to my hubbie upstairs and he said ffs I bet that won't be the end of that. I wasn't worried until he said that, but now I am. Not because we did anything wrong, I'm just a worrier by nature and suffer with anxiety, and I currently have a lot going on in my personal life, and I really don't need the added worry of this, wondering if a social worker is going to check up on us now.
Just to clarify, it is ok that my husband was minding our kids while I was out, even though he was upstairs and the kids were downstairs, right? He can't be in the same room as them at all times, he has to have video calls etc.

Gerianam

Hi Sunrise Sunset,
A lot depends on their ages of course but why are the kids answering the door ?

Sunrise_Sunset

They didn't answer the door. But can see the front door from the sitting room where they were, and vice versa.
They are 7 and 5.

gipi

I wouldn't have thought that social workers called to homes "on spec", or sit outside? Did they show ID when you spoke to them?

starbaby2003

This is very odd behaviour. I would call Tusla. Seems strange.

Mr Tickle

This seems like a common sense one. You're grand. you'll never hear from them again. Our social services are so underfunded that they couldn't afford to look into you even if they wanted to.

Sunrise_Sunset

No they didn't show ID.
I just presumed it was maybe their first time visiting the family they were supposed to be visiting, and they had gotten the address wrong.

Gerianam

Perhaps someone reported that the kids seemed to be home alone.

manonboard

very unlikely you will hear from them again. They did right by checking if you left your kids on their own.
you explained your husband is in and just didnt want to answer the door. Thats perfectly ok.

they are likely comfortable your kids are safe. You've done nothing wrong and unless there are other things to notice, you and your husband are safely caring for your kids.

If your kids opened the door. That would be a different story. They may think your husband is rude, but thats not a problem. They have lots of other work to do and are likely consumed by it. They probably had more free time today because they had the wrong address so had some time to burn up.

Sunrise_Sunset

starbaby2003 wrote: »

This is very odd behaviour. I would call Tusla. Seems strange.

Really?

bullpost

Gerianam wrote: »

Perhaps someone reported that the kids seemed to be home alone.

Based on what?

Sunrise_Sunset

manonboard wrote: »

very unlikely you will hear from them again. They did right by checking if you left your kids on their own.
you explained your husband is in and just didnt want to answer the door. Thats perfectly ok.

they are likely comfortable your kids are safe. You've done nothing wrong and unless there are other things to notice, you and your husband are safely caring for your kids.

If your kids opened the door. That would be a different story. They may think your husband is rude, but thats not a problem. They have lots of other work to do and are likely consumed by it. They probably had more free time today because they had the wrong address so had some time to burn up.

Yes, I agree she was probably doing the right thing by coming back to check up. I mean, are parents ever 100% of the time in the same room as their kids though? It's impossible.

Mr Tickle

Gerianam wrote: »

Perhaps someone reported that the kids seemed to be home alone.

That seems unlikely. someone gave/took a wrong address like they said.

Mr. Occam's badly needs a shave.

Sunrise_Sunset

I have it drummed into the kids heads not to answer the door, that only Mam or Dad are allowed to answer the door, hence why they didn't answer the door.

Sunrise_Sunset

Gerianam wrote: »

Perhaps someone reported that the kids seemed to be home alone.

My next door neighbour is nosey parker, but she is aware that my husband works from home two or 3 days per week.

venusdoom

I think this is strange that they didn't produce I.D. And just they called back later. I would call your local Tusla office to query whether they were genuine social workers. Don't worry. Your husband was upstairs, the children were fine and not left alone in the house. I don't even know why they would question if your children were alone. You could have easily been outside the back or doing something important that you couldn't answer the door. I would absolutely ring for clarification and to ease my mind that it wasn't something more sinister.

jam_mac_jam

This is very strange behavior from a social worker, to call back because they thought the kids were on their own. How did they know this? Are they allowed go around looking in random windows. This seems very strange to me.

s7ryf3925pivug

Even if she didn't believe you I doubt anything would happen. I've heard that they are under-resourced and unable to do much about non-critical cases.

Sunrise_Sunset

Oh feck, I'm even more concerned now. I hadn't even thought that they might not really be social workers.

TheValeyard

I wouldnt worry. If it is Tusla, they are so slow and incompetent that by the time they actually decided to investigate you, the kids would be 18+

jam_mac_jam

Well they might be but if they are they shouldn't be calling back and commenting about nobody being there without a complaint being made. They can't just wander around trying to catch people out they need to have a suspicion.
I wouldn't worry, your partner was upstairs. Its just none of their business who answers the door or not.

appledrop

Firstly relax you have done nothing wrong.

If anyone is in the wrong its them. They should know what house they are meant to be going to + not going knocking on random doors.

Also its perfectly reasonable that you kids refused to answer the door to strangers. Your husband could have been in toilet for all they knew!

You explained the situation so they have no leg to stand on.

appledrop

By the way they have probably also breached GDPR by giving you the name of family they were supposed to visit.

starbaby2003

Sunrise_Sunset wrote: »

Oh feck, I'm even more concerned now. I hadn't even thought that they might not really be social workers.

That’s why I would call Tusla. Whole thing seems suspect. Sounds more like they are from the social and checking out a house in your park.

jam_mac_jam

appledrop wrote: »

Firstly relax you have done nothing wrong.

If anyone is in the wrong its them. They should know what house they are meant to be going to + not going knocking on random doors.

Also its perfectly reasonable that you kids refused to answer the door to strangers. Your husband could have been in toilet for all they knew!

You explained the situation so they have no leg to stand on.

Exactly, the fact that the kids didn't answer the door is better. They have no right to comment on this.

Sunrise_Sunset

What if I do call Tusla and they make a big deal of it? Can the investigate because of this?
But I kind of want to call them to find out if they really were social workers.

Christy42

Ring and confirm that social workers were in the vicinity. Especially if they didn't show id. Just ask to confirm that some were in the vicinity and you were worried in case someone was impersonating them. They won't follow it up unless there were no social workers there.

This could well be a handy excuse to see who is about. I would be more worried about that than actual social workers worried you weren't within 5ft of your children 24/7.

SusieBlue

I don't answer the door if I'm not expecting anyone and I don't answer the phone to unknown numbers, its common sense and there should be no cause for concern or suspicion on that front.
You don't have to justify yourself at all, you and your husband are perfectly entitled to ignore unexpected door knockers (cause that's what they are) if you wish.

The fact that they didn't produce ID is a bit peculiar though, so I would definitely be bringing that to Túsla's attention. They need to know if people are going around pretending to be social workers.

dartboardio

She wasn't a social worker. I'd say they could have been scoping out the place!

No social worker would go out of their way on a job to knock on someones door and presume someones children are home alone because they see them in a window :S

Very unrealistic.

BTW please don't worry. You'll never see them again,just one of those weird stories

SusieBlue

dartboardio wrote: »

She wasn't a social worker. I'd say they could have been scoping out the place!

No social worker would go out of their way on a job to knock on someones door and presume someones children are home alone because they see them in a window :S

Very unrealistic.

BTW please don't worry. You'll never see them again,just one of those weird stories

Yeah, I'm inclined to agree with this.
In any dealings I've had with Túsla I've found them to be very reasonable but extremely underresourced.
With no prior background info on OP here is just no way they would be bothered about a solitary instance of kids watching tv while dad is busy upstairs.
They wouldn't even have the resources to investigate it if they wanted to, which is why the "social workers" actions are all the more suspicious.

venusdoom

If you do ring to question this, (I think you should) will you update us with the outcome? It's frightening to think that people possibly are going around during midterm sussing out if kids are alone in the house.