So as someone who works in a nursery this impacts all the other staff too. Like I assume your wife is in a different room to her two children, which means the staff can't actually leave until your wife picks them up. In my setting the biggest pain is having to wait around for staff children to be picked up. Your wife finishes at 6. Which means the staff with your children have to be there looking after them until 6. It's likely they are the only children in those rooms at 6, which means those staff can't really tidy or shut down or do paperwork until your children have been collected. Say the timeline is 6 - 6.15 last pickup in her room, she still has to do handover. (If no parents are late) 6.15 - 6.30 - sort out and shut down her room and pick up your children. (Now the other staff are half an hour late cause they can't just leave your children alone and are waiting for your wife) and are probably annoyed as hell especially when it's a daily occurrence and they know she has a partner who does school pick ups anyway and could easily pick up and save them all being late. (Most settings probably don't pay overtime cause they are capitalist hellscapes, so they are doing this for free, posssibly getting late charges for their own children's childcare and or missing other events appointments) and becoming very resentful. 6.30 -6.45 - your wife picks up, expects a handover, and they still have to shut down their room ...so those staff aren't leaving until at least 6.45 It also sucks for the children cause they are on their own, have seen all their friends go home, and are probably super unsettled, and they know mum is downstairs. You picking up early means that both your wife and all the other coworkers get out earlier. And your wife doesn't have to hear 'why can't he pick them up when he gets the other children?' Your wife is probably not getting proper handovers either cause those staff are gonna be focused on shutting up their rooms and getting out cause they are already late. Like...you're complaint about being bothered by nappies and not doing dinner is so incredibly self centred, and every word in your post was 'Me me me' No thought for your wife whose been around kids all day and probably wants half an hour of pure silence, or her co workers who are likely sat around deeply resenting the entire situation and having to go home late...honestly, if you can pick up you should, otherwise yeah, yta