Thank you so much for all of your replies. It seems the majority of you feel I was right to expect a call pretty quickly. Admittedly there was no call placed to my parents when I was at school 30 years ago, but we don't live in the same world that we did 30 years ago. You used to be able to play outside the house or down the street until sunset, unsupervised, but you can't do that now. My guess is the ones that don't expect a call are the ones who are not responsible for children. When you have a child there is nothing more precious to you and if my child has not arrived at school first thing, I expect a call so that I can take responsibility for it immediately, not at 2pm. My child is only 8 and whilst he knows how to take his inhaler, I admire the school for taking responsibility and helping me to administer it safely when I am not there. I don't expect the school to pay for my son's lunches, but there are families out there who can't afford a proper lunch and not everybody is that privileged. So I admire the schools for sharing the load. To all the parents who give their time voluntarily to help the schools, thank you.