Child care centres

[brookey]

Hi guys,

I'm about to put my 11 month year old into childcare for 1 day a week soon so i can get my study done! Ive rung around 2 centres and they have both told me a different daily rate.

One was an ABC learning centre and the other a new smaller child care centre. The difference between the 2 was about $17 so im just wondering how they work this out? Do they have their own rate that they charge? I figured coz the ABC is a big company they can charge more....

I will keep doing some home work on this coz i dont want to be paying too much for a service i can get elsewhere which is just as good if not better (in that a smaller company may be more focussed toward individual care?).

I am entitled to 100% rebate for the child care benefit. :)

Any tips/advice from anyone on this?

[Rhoxie]

Each Child care centre charges their own rates (ABC are more expensive than all the others in my area). The 100% bit means that you pay the difference between the govt. subsidy and what the childcare centre actually charges (sort of like doctors gaps).

One thing to keep in mind with ABC is they generally move children out of the babies room at 18m rather than at 2yrs like other centres. I've also had an ABC director tell me that babies are too little/young for arts and crafts etc. so they don't do them. (this was a centre in the Canningvale area).

[Starlet]

Go in and take ur bub with you and stay there for a while to see how they run things before you enrol them.

My kids are much happier at a smaller based daycare than they ever were at ABC. They said the same thing at the ABC my kids went to about the babies being too young for arts and crafts.

[brookey]

Thanks guys. I will definitely do that, the ABC one just showed me through and it was very rigid i found. The workers seemed nice but a bit over the top, maybe all child care workers are a bit "happy" though? hehe.

I will have a look at the little one i mentioned earlier :)

Any more advice or experiences are welcome!

[tamiah06]

hi
i used to be a worker for an abc centre and although i cant slander them due to the fact i dont need a court case i can say i recomend u find a privatly owned centre or a community based centre the rates may be higher but least u know the money is going to resources for the children and not to the coperate company to build more centres. i donnot recommend abc for personal prefrences.

[Chickadee]

You might also want to check out family day care. Contact your council or the National Childcare Accreditation Council website to find out who runs the scheme in your area.

Family day care schemes are run under similar rules and legislation as day care centres, but consist of individual carers in their own homes who are all supervised under a local scheme. Carers have police clearance, access to training and support, random inspections, etc. Child ratios are typically 4:1.

[Elmopalooza]

Hi Brookey..

Where about r u?? NOR or SOR??? The Child Care centre that i have Amity in is FANTASTIC!! :smiliedance: Let me know where u are and i will PM u their details if u like!

[brookey]

Thanks for your help guys. I just had a not so great feeling about the ABC and then the price was so expensive i thought nahh there must be some better ones out there! I also didnt like the fact that when i asked what would happen if Maya cried and wouldnt sleep, and she laughed and said oh well we will just let her cry! :mad: If anyone is going to do CC or similar it will be me, and i am so not prepared to do that with her for personal reasons. Anyway i just thought that was wrong....and especially the way she laughed like she couldnt care less.

I think the smaller one i have been talking about is a family day care centre....

Amitys_Mum, i am SOR near Cannington but moving to Parmelia (Kwinana way) in about 2-4 weeks time! Id love to know though if your centre is around those areas?

Thanks again everyone!!

[little mermaid]

I would strongly advise you do check out all avenues before going to an ABC centre.

[brookey]

Yup, i will definitley be not putting Maya into an ABC learning centre. The feeling and experience i had visiting it was enough to send me off it but the responses ive had in this thread and advice has totally proven that i should trust my instincts, plus i dont want to be ripped off when we really cant afford to be!

[kiwibird27]

Each centre sets there own daily rate - but the government pay the same amount ,your at 100% so u claim a max of $2.88 (not exact) per hour for up to the max u can claim for in a week (see below)!! - so the difference your talking about is the difference between daily fee charged and government subsidy (Gap fee, like medicare)- The only other difference is wether your claiming 20 or 50 hours per week, which makes a huge difference in fees, but not for only one day!!
You will notice a difference if you increase to 2 days, the centre is open for 11 hours a day and you only get 20 hours per week of CCB, then 2 of those hours each week don't include childcare benefit ( THATS WHY THE 2ND DAY FOR 20 HR CLIENTS IS MORE EXPENSIVE NORMALLY) The same is true for 50 hour clients the 5th day becomes hugely expensive, because the additional 5 hours the centre is open cannot be claimed by 50 hr a week parents, so it's at full rate, charged on the 5th day!!

Hope i haven't confused u further!!!

Heaps of threads about finding quality childcare - just go searching, can't write it all again!!!