Can anyone who uses FDC tell me how much it costs? Is it an hourly rate, daily rate? My council has outsourced it and I can't get onto the outsourced company, grr.
TIA!
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Can anyone who uses FDC tell me how much it costs? Is it an hourly rate, daily rate? My council has outsourced it and I can't get onto the outsourced company, grr.
TIA!
Don't know but or council out sources everything so they don't have to take any flipping responsibility!
FDC is an hourly rate. Anywhere from $7-11 an hour and you only pay for what you use. Some of them have a 6hr minimum.
You supply food, snacks and nappies for the day as well.
Some Family Day Carers will supply food and snacks, it's more encouraged you supply the food so as it doesn't take away their time from your child.
Family Day Care is often private through places like VIP Family Day Care.
About to do a a school run, will pop back later. :)
ETA:
As MM has mentioned, a lot of Councils no longer run Family Day Care. It is mostly private operators places like VIP or in our area we also have Precious Stars and Wyndham Early Learning who then sub contract FDC operators.
They are still heavily regulated with spot checks by the Private Operators to their sub contractors to make sure the homes are safe and the kids are being looked after appropriately.
My DD has just finished with one FDC and I was given a folio of her work for the year. They track her learning and what she does and what the Family Day Carer can do to improve your childs learning experience.
They are only allowed a certain number of children in their care at one time and they cannot have just little little babies. They usually have 1 or two little babies, toddler then older toddler.
It's a great environment for little babies as it's a home environment. I have just moved DD into a crèche facility as she is now 4yrs old and needs to be around kids more her age for her next step into school.
HTH
I think it changes from state to state and Carer to Carer...our FDC in Qld was an hourly rate, no minimum hours, byo food. In WA our Carer charged an hourly rate, but a 7hr minimum (some had 8hrs) with food provided.
Shop around to find what you want...
It really depends on the person who is doing it and who their *boss* is (as im what family day care provider they go through*
My family day carer doesnt have a minimum hours, she charges 6.50 an hour - I supply everything. She does school runs etc.
Ring around and find a person that suits you best - some only work certain hours/certain days. Its really good to interview a few and go from there to make your decision.
Also look into the provider - how involed they are, how many visits etc.
I can say from personal experience mine is one of a kind - she does beyond what is necessary, is fantastic with the kids - amd the providers rinf me directly if they ever need to.
Cat that sounds like the sort of person I am looking for. I want someone who could possibly do kinder runs. Do they drive your girls or do they walk? Walk the girls to school I mean.
MM, I am so annoyed with how they have done it. I sent off an email enquiry Thursday, got an email back Friday saying basically please call me on this number (which was a mobile) to discuss, then it said "my working hours are 9.30am-3.30pm Tues-Thurs". I don't know who this person was, she just signed it with a first name, no position or anything to indicate who she was or who she worked for. I also have no idea why she emailed me on her apparent day off, and gave me a mobile number. I was tempted to ring her when I checked my email, which was 10pm :lol:
So I rang it today, got voicemail. Left message. Decided to ring the outsourced company direct. Rang them. Left message :wall: Someone rang back several hours later and said she would send me a list of FDC providers in our suburb. So, have I had an email? No.
Sigh!
OP - she drives. Has even dropped off the kids to be if I have been sick or picked them up when I reversed into my garage lol.
The car had to be all up to scratch and the providers had to have a look at it to look at seating etc.
Can you just look up family day careers within your area? And start from there (as well as speak to that lady) like I said it takes a bit of digging to find a gem ;) my friend does it down near Newcastle shes awesome converted the whole end of her house as a childcare room it's awesome.
Cat can you pm me the details of the person you use please :) JIC I decide to go back to work this year :)
Nope the council isn't listing it anymore and the provider just says you have to contact them for details.
If the random person doesn't ring me tomorrow, I'll try them (before 3.30 obviously!) and failing that I'll call the general number again.
We pay $7.45 per hour, and she charges a minimum of 8 hours. My girls are only there for about 6-7 hours but I don't mind paying the extra hour because she is way cheaper than a centre-based daycare is. We did have to wait about 8 months to find a place though.
ETA - We were given the name and phone number of the carer and had to contact her ourselves. We were on the wait list for a few months and they got us to meet with a lady that I was really uncomfortable with after meeting her, so I said no thank. We then had to wait another 6 months but our carer could not be more amazing.
A lot of FDC will do the Kinder runs, they usually drive them and you may need to supply a car seat depending on what they have.
You will find there are a lot of lovely people who do FDC because they love kids and will treat yours as their own. Take them to play group, story time at the library and the odd treat if it's ok with you :)
There are of course those who do it for the money, you will know when you visit OP, trust me. Instinct kicks in.
Some will run 6am to 7pm and others only 8-5pm.
You have been given the run around OP! Hope it works out for you!