Child Care Providers... Please Give Me Your Best Advice.

I have to disagree with the previous poster. I had a contract with a family who decided to quit with no notice. I took them to and all claims court and won. Definitely have a contract. Red leaf press makes some good very basic contacts.

Things to know
Keep the kids in the central part of your home. Don't let them take over your children's rooms.
Set your hours /rates. Be flexible but not a doormat.
Charge weekly. Get payment on Mondays. Don't take money off of your pay just because they take a day off to go to the zoo. Their choice. You were ready to work.
Give yourself a vacation each year
Set a good schedule with both active physical play and quiet play.
Have a age appropriate toys and supplies
Have your rates figured out before you interview families
Have your references ready but a also ask them for references
If you get any warning tingles from a family be wary of taking them and try to figure out what's off for you before you accept them in.

When I had my preschool-- best advice I got:
Become a registered LLC. It will be a firewall against losing your personal assets should something bad happen.

Find insurance for your business. When I had my preschool I carried a $1 million policy against any liability. I also had a liability waiver in my contract with parents (excluding neglect, of course).

Monthly tuition. Seriously, you only want to do that paperwork and bank deposits once a month.

There are a lot of good preschool curriculum programs you can find online, some for free, some are for-pay. I designed my own seasonal curriculum based on my groups abilities and interests.

I had a program which was strictly preschool. If I'd had sibs, I would have offered a 10% discount. Many family daycares charge 10% less for the least-expensive child's rate.

You might want to go online and find preschools in your area and print out their contracts/enrollment forms and conditions. I would add a clause of a two-week trial period and conditions for exclusion of care; if you are charging a late fee for parents (either for late tuition or late pick-up... ) you need to include that. Some child care providers offer a 10 minute grace period and then a certain dollar amount per set amount of time (think $5 for 5 minutes or the like... just an example).

Thing I wish I'd known-- your home is not your home, it becomes your workplace. Be very clear about designated areas for which activities. When I had my preschool, it was in our living room/dining room/kitchen/bathroom area and it LOOKED like a preschool. This time around, after a year and half, we were wanting our home back, a couch... that sort of thing. And remember that you have to clean every.single.day, prep for the next day (meals, snacks) etc., vacuum every day and sweep/spot clean the floors (at the least) every day after the kids go home. Dishes and house pickup/laundry all need to be done before care starts the next day. Cleanliness is one thing many parents will be very attuned to. And you need to have space/labeling for the kids as to where their belongings go. It is a huge commitment. Good luck!

I have my clients pay me either every week or every other week. I charge a weekly rate and if people pay by the month I get short changed. Payment is due on Monday for the week to come, so basically families are paying ahead.

Call around and find out the going rate for in-home care and facility care. I set my price at the top of the in-home scale but below the facility rate. I have found that charging a premium price (and offering a good service) attracts higher end clients. These clients are less likely to give you problems with payment, etc.

Make sure you give yourself time off.

Good Luck!

M

In addition, part-time kiddos are a pain. They are less likely to get used to your place so they can really disrupt things. Sooooo, you can charge a little more for a part-time client, $45 a day rather than $40. Part-time for me is full days, no half days, that completely screws up my schedule with the other kiddos.

I am a fellow daycare provider in Wyoming (Cheyenne) and while the other ladies gave some sound advice in general, Wyoming is different than much of the nation on our child care rules so I'm going to pm you my phone number! Please feel free to call me and I'd be happy to share my experience in daycare plus setting up the daycare and share my documents as well. If I wrote here, it will be a novel! :-)

I am not a provider but I have used home daycare and preschool centers. In my experience, part time can be based on less than 4 hrs a day or can be less than two days per week. Depends on how you set it up. It's best to set a policy and spell it all out in your contract but the good providers are willing to work with the families (while not getting taken advantage of). Most that I have dealt with were a set price per week but part-timers paid per hour or day depending on how they attended.

Things to include is if payment is due at the start of the week (pay ahead) or at the end of the week.(after care has been provided), what is considered overtime, late payment and/or late pick ups, hours of operation and if there are limits to care (is open 6 am - 6 pm but rate includes only 9 or 10 hours per day...if you utilize that option, keep in mind that if a parent works 8 hours a day w/ 1 hr lunch that is the 9 hour period which does not allow for travel time to or from).

Most offer 10% discount for 2nd child but you have to work out what works for you.

HI JS,

I'm a little late responding, but I've just now had a chance to write...This could be a really long response, but I don't want to do that, so feel free to private message me if you want specifics. I'd be happy to pass along advice and experience.

I think when I started I googled contracts online and I edited one to meet the policies I wanted. It was much easier than trying to think of everything and write one from scratch. Happy to share that if you want a copy. It's long and covers any questions that parents ever have. Whether having a contract hold up in court or not, I don't know... but it is still worth taking the time to create one. It makes parents realize that you are serious about running your business and lets them know ahead of time what your expectations are. And it just makes things clearer and easier all around. For instance, if you have nothing in there about a late pick up policy, it can be awkward to try to talk to a parent about that when it comes up. In terms of payment, my parents pay at the beginning of the month, (so they prepay like rent).

Decide what kind of program you want to have. I like having structure in mine because he kids know what to expect. But mine is also child directed, so if I have easel painting planned for the day and no one want to paint, then we do something else. I did not start out with a preschool facet, but I did many "preschool" things and now after 5 years, I have a preschool component. Parents will appreciate that you've given some though in to what the days will look like and they like a schedule, so make one and post it on the wall.

If you have kids keep their rooms off limits unless you're using them for napping...and then use them for napping only. Let you kids know that anything in the "daycare area" is fair game for kids to play with so if they don't want to share something they should put it in their rooms. You'll have plenty of other toys for the daycare kids to use.

There's so much more I could write, but it would be a novel... The last thing I'll say here though, is to realize that having a daycare in your house is a lot of work and a huge commitment if you do it well. It's much more than the hours that you have kids. Your home is your work, so you have to keep it clean and picked up... company ready all the time. plan meals, plan activities, organize... My house looks like a preschool and there are times that I would just like to have a house. But there are a lot of benefits to being self employed. Be sure to give your self time off though or you'll burn out.

Good luck!

Start by checking in with your state, familiarize yourself with all the regulations. Find another provider in your area and ask her to mentor you. Getting advice from others across the country will be confusing, because all of our situations are do different. When you are starting out, you generally do things differently than when you are experienced. For example, after almost 20 years, I am paid 52 weeks a year, same rate. I use a company called Vanco Services for payment. It's direct deposit: I collect a voided check when I'm enrolling a new client, sign them up on the website, and the tuition leaves the parent's account on Friday and hits my bank on Wednesday. They charge 25 cents per transaction, so I (happily) pay about $5 per month for this service. Taking the payment issue "off the table," makes your life SO much easier. Most young parents these days don't write checks anyway - daycare is old-school that way. I don't take part-time, or dicker about 4 hours, 6 hours, yada yada. If they are taking up a spot, it costs a certain amount of dollars per week, period. I don't offer discounts to families of two or more. (I do joke, "You want a discounted rate? OK, which child should I NOT give as much care to?")

Decide on your policies and INTERVIEW thoroughly. This is where providers get themselves into trouble. They don't get to know the families well enough, and then are surprised when problems pop up. Interview more than once, and offer to go to their home for the second interview! Makes it easier on them, and you can learn more about their family dynamics (which will become very important to you). Stand firm on your policies. Be tough, they will respect you for it. Life won't end if a family leaves. Don't let that fear hold you hostage. Don't give them all the power in your relationship. I consider myself just as important as my clients: we are equal in importance - they are as kind and thoughtful to me as I am to them.

I could go on and on, but it's overwhelming to read. Good luck to you - child care can be a great job - please message me if you'd like, I love talking about this stuff.