Questions for licensed providers

*EDIT* By 'licensed' I mean "a home child care provider who works with an agency. And sorry, I was asking about Ontario providers. But feel free to share if you're in another province***

If you currently work for a licensing agency, could you answer afew questions?
Does the agency set your hours?
Does the agency take money from all of your payments, including families that are not through your agency?
Does your agency determine how much your private families will pay you?
Are your private rates more or less than the agencies rates?
Does the agency choose your activities/outings?
Does the agency choose the type of care you may provide (attachment parenting/non etc)

I am licensed through my city, and none of this is true for me...but I keep reading in the anti bill 10 groups and website that this is typical for licensing agencies.
Thanks!

In Ontario you cannot be personally licensed. You can be independent or work for a licensed agency. You can not be licensed by your city.

The rules vary greatly across the country. Bill 10 will only affect those providers in Ontario.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Wonderwiper

In Ontario you cannot be personally licensed. You can be independent or work for a licensed agency. You can not be licensed by your city.

The rules vary greatly across the country. Bill 10 will only affect those providers in Ontario.

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Yes, I'm aware. But licensed/unlicensed are the generally accepted terms. But I will edit the original post so I don't have to argue semantics with the anti bill 10ers.

Only posted to let you know that every province is different. You said you are licensed through your city....so you don't live in Ontario therefore your agency will be different.

*sigh*
Getting back on track.
Any providers working with an agency or their regions home child care program care to chime in? I can't find anyone on any daycare site who will tell me that their agency tells them they can't work past 5.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by kennyquinn

*EDIT* By 'licensed' I mean "a home child care provider who works with an agency. And sorry, I was asking about Ontario providers. But feel free to share if you're in another province***

If you currently work for a licensing agency, could you answer afew questions?
Does the agency set your hours?
Does the agency take money from all of your payments, including families that are not through your agency?
Does your agency determine how much your private families will pay you?
Are your private rates more or less than the agencies rates?
Does the agency choose your activities/outings?
Does the agency choose the type of care you may provide (attachment parenting/non etc)

I am licensed through my city, and none of this is true for me...but I keep reading in the anti bill 10 groups and website that this is typical for licensing agencies.
Thanks!

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Okay - I'm in NS and although not licensed by choice, I mentor several newer day home providers as legislation is my strong point, some of them are registered/licensed.

In answer to your questions - it varies here. NS Day care regulations set the minimum requirements but we have 5 day home agencies in this municipality and some of those have additional requirements from their registered day homes. I'll answer each question individually.

1. Does the agency set your hours?
No. In NS, in-home day care providers, registered or not, are viewed as self-employed and as such, we set our own hours. Out of the 5 home care agencies locally, three of them have a requirement that their carer's are open a min. of 9 hours per day but the carer chooses what hours. Those three agencies will decline accepting a day home into their group if they aren't open at least 9 hours. The remaining two agencies have no such requirements.
I will add that typically parents here work 8 hours plus per day and so, for those travelling into Dartmouth or Halifax which is where most employment is, a half hour journey in and out of work would only be achieved on a clear day with no hold ups. Most day homes in this area are open for 10 hours or more. Being open less just wouldn't meet most parent's day care needs and by default, that day home will struggle to find clients.

2. Does the agency take money from all of your payments, including families that are not through your agency?
Okay - maybe I am not understanding your question but here, the agency takes no money from any client of a day-home provider!

An agency (here at least) receives a grant from the government for each and every day home provider they are supervising/licencing/who is part of their agency. The individual day homes NEVER make a payment to the agency for their services.

Here, we may have no more than 6 children including our own if ours are younger than 12 years - this applies whether or not we are registered/approved by an agency.

A registered/approved day home is the only option other than a facility for parents who are entitled to subsidized care in NS. Again though, the agency doesn't take fees.

What happens is any parent entitled to assistance is awarded a daily amount of subsidiary based on their personal situation (income level, hours worked/at school etc). For FT care, the current max amount is $22 a day. For before and after school care the current max amount is $17 a day.

Each in-home provider, set their own rates. So for the sake of example, let's say the rate is $30 a day. Client A is awarded $22 per day subsidiary. This means the client would pay the provider directly the $8 per day difference based on the providers own schedule of fees. That might be monthly in advance, it might be two-weekly in advance, it might be weekly at the end of the week - it is completely up to the provider to determine their own fee schedule and the client has to pay an fees not covered by the subsidiary directly to the carer as per her business fee schedule.

So if client B is entitled to $18.00 per day subsidiary, the parents would have to pay the provider $12 a day based on her fee schedule.

And if all other clients were not entitled to subsidiary, then those four sets of parents would pay the full $30 a day, directly to the provider as per her fee schedule.

At the end of the month, for the two subsidized children, the provider would have to submit attendance records to the agency for the rest of her fees. The agency would consolidate all of the subsidiary fees due for all of their in-home providers and submit that invoice/bill to the government. Once approved for payment, the government then sends back one payment to the agency and the agency distributes the funds out to the individual providers.

They would have to send the full $22 per day for Client A and the full $18 a day for client B. The agency gets to keep NOTHING of the day care fees. They don't get involved at all with the fees for the 4 sets of parents who pay the full rate themselves.

There is no grant or top-up for any of the places here. The above outlines everything the providers in NS get. Essentially we get paid our daily rate x the number of children we have. Part of the money comes from parents and the rest comes from the government for subsidiary entitled clients. Empty places go no income from any source.

Hope that answers your question.

3. Does your agency determine how much your private families will pay you?
No. We set our own rates as per our local market/experience/services offered/demand/hours. The government assesses if a family is entitled to financial help and if so, the level of help they get. The agency has no say in either the fees we set or the amount of assistance parents get. The agency receives no payment from their carers or the carer's clients and so it's irrelevant to them what we charge.

4, Are your private rates more or less than the agencies rates?
For the quality day care homes, the rates are about the same. Big facilities in the core of down town might charge between $40 and $45 but that would be for an exceptional day care which offered very long hours in an incredibly high demand area.
Day homes (registered or not) more commonly charge between $30 and $38 - with $38 being incredibly rare. These fees would all include two snacks, milk, and a hot lunch as per Canada's food guide as we have to provide these according to our regs.
Day homes which are just starting up, where the carer has no child care based experience other than parenting, or who operate under the table and don't issue receipts, are incredibly common here and sadly, that pushes down the prices for the legitimate providers, even if they are registered.

5. Does the agency choose your activities/outings?
Absolutely not. However, if an agency felt that a provider was not offering the activities which promoted the education and/or development of children, they would and could certainly insist on changes to the program.
Here, if an agency doesn't feel one of their providers is abiding by the legislation and meeting the objectives, they are meant to support their carer's in making the changes but if a provider is not willing to do so, their registered/approved status can be withdrawn by the agency with very little notice.

6. Does the agency choose the type of care you may provide (attachment parenting/non etc)
No. But our legislation is such that AP would be very hard to accommodate in an agency approved day home or even a facility.

For example, we must have a crib for each child younger than 24 months for "scheduled" nap time, which has bedding/a blanket with an appropriate weight for the season". (That's effectively one rule but from memory so the wording might be a bit different.

By default this means that there is an expectation that a sleeping child is in that crib and not being worn/carried around.

Also, meal times here have to be scheduled and children must be fed approx every 2.4-3 hours whether that be a snack or when the main meal is offered. Again this conflicts with some AP views where a child is fed on their own schedule.

Sorry for the lengthy explanation but hope that clarifies for what happens in NS.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by kennyquinn

*sigh*
Getting back on track.
Any providers working with an agency or their regions home child care program care to chime in? I can't find anyone on any daycare site who will tell me that their agency tells them they can't work past 5.

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Not in this Province! LOL Jeez, most parent finish at 5pm earliest and they still have to come and get their child.

Most carer's here finish between 5pm and 5.30pm depending on their location but there are lots who go until 6pm or even later.

EDIT - We have a lot of military personal here and we have a lot of shift workers, mainly nurses as there are several hospitals down town which serve the entire Maritimes. This means lots of parents work revolving shifts of 12 hours or more and as such, the demand for extended hours is high. There are some day care providers here who work until 11pm and others who even go into the early hours of the morning. They might do this for their entire client base i.e. focussing their business on the shift workers needs or they might do it just for one or two clients meaning they open at 7am but some days are still going for certain clients until very late.

In this situation, it's common to have an arrangement with the parent that the child is taken in the car with the provider and her family, to events like sports meetings for the carer's own children, grocery shopping etc. It would be impossible for a carer to offer the same program during the day and into the evening.

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Originally Posted by Rachael

Not in this Province! LOL Jeez, most parent finish at 5pm earliest and they still have to come and get their child.

Most carer's here finish between 5pm and 5.30pm depending on their location but there are lots who go until 6pm or even later.

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There is this blog going around telling about the horrors of working for an agency, and it states that agencies set your hours. And that if she (the writer) were to join an agency she would no longer be able to work with parents flexible schedules etc...
But I can't find anyone to verify this. I work for my regions home child care program and I have kids from 6am until 8:30pm and sometimes on weekends!
I'm just feeling irritated because spreading that type of misinformation is bad for MY business.

OK no, the agency does not set your hours. At least, not here it doesn't. The problem is that agencies are not the same across the province. Some give providers a certain amount per kid, per meal for food, some pay providers more to include food. Some won't take on a provider with a pool, for instance, no matter how it's fenced. To ask if "agencies" in general do something is hard to answer.
As far as I am aware, agencies set fees and take a cut, amounting to anywhere between $8-$10 a day per child. As far as I know, you can take on private clients, but anyone requiring subsidy will have to go through the agency.

In my city, there are no agency providers who work past 5. That is the provider's choice, however, not the agencies. I don't work past 5 either. Some agencies give providers a lot of support, some are a complete joke. I would never work for either agency in my city, but I have young children of my own, so even if I wanted to, it wouldn't make financial sense.

I am extremely anti-Bill 10, but understand that some providers want the support of an agency. In that regard, I think that agency rules should have to be the same across the province, so everyone can actually make an informed decision. I also don't believe that agency providers should be allowed 6 children instead of 5, and to be able to waive the 2 under 2 rule. Just because a provider around the corner from me has wee watch come in once a month and lie about an inspection (I've seen it happen), does not make them a more capable provider than me.

I'll stop now, but to answer your question, as far a I am aware, agencies set your fees and their cut, not hours.

"To ask if "agencies" in general do something is hard to answer. "

I was asking for personal experiences from providers working for agencies.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by kennyquinn

There is this blog going around telling about the horrors of working for an agency, and it states that agencies set your hours. And that if she (the writer) were to join an agency she would no longer be able to work with parents flexible schedules etc...
But I can't find anyone to verify this. I work for my regions home child care program and I have kids from 6am until 8:30pm and sometimes on weekends!
I'm just feeling irritated because spreading that type of misinformation is bad for MY business.

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Although not impossible, it seems a bit fishy to me. I'd be interested in where the author is based.

Why I say not impossible....

Years ago, in this Municipality, there was one day home agency. I won't mention their name as incredibly, they are still in business.

This agency imposed several conditions on it's home providers which were rather restrictive to their businesses.

For instance - our regs state a registered provider cannot have more than 3 children under 36 months and out of those three, no more than two can be younger than 24 months. It's commonly summarized as "no more than 2 under 2, no more than 3 under 3" although it's a bit more complicated than that, you get the idea. This particular agency added that it's carer's couldn't have more than one under one, more than two under two, more than three under three and no more than four under four which means to fill all 6 places, two of the 6 had to have had their 4th birthday. Since they go to school here at 5, it was a constantly revolving door of interviews and new clients.

They had/have other additional rules too.

For instance, our regs allow us to arrange cover for carer appointments during the day and ideally that cover should be provided by our supporting agency. But this particular agency didn't want to be called out to homes and so added their own requirement that no carer appointments could be made during business hours and no cover can be offered/provided due to carer unavailability. The insisting on the day home closing and losing that income.

How do they get away with it?

Because prior to 2009, subsidized places were awarded to the agency, and with this being the only agency locally, they of course had all of the allocated places for subsidized care.

It is very key that understand that subsidized care was available by a allocated number of places vs today's system of allocated funds.

This meant the agency had a pool of parents desperately waiting for a subsidized place to open up and often, paying full rates elsewhere whilst they did wait for a subsidized spot. If a private client left, this did not free up a subsidized place. The wait list was for when a subsidized client made a vacancy.

However, with one agency holding all the local funding all the local subsidized places, it also meant enough places for their carers to fill all their spots with financially assisted families. Plus, any agency provider was sure to have vacancies filled immediately.

Essentially, this agency held all the power. Parents needing financial assistance with child care had to go to this agency. Providers who needed to know they would operate at 100% capacity went to this agency because they knew that's where the pool of waiting clients was. The agency grew and because it is paid based on the number of provider's it has, they were in a win-win situation.

As such, they were able legally, to include additional requirements from their carer's which made the task of dealing with so many registered care homes more manageable because it reduced the support they offered.

However, 2009 brought changes.

Instead of child care funding being allocated in terms of a set number of places per agency, the funding was attached to the child needing care. This allowed parents to go directly to the care providers, and over time, the pool of clients as the agency was reduced. The wait list was laughable because now parents weren't waiting their turn but hunting down their own registered provider and getting on all the individual waiting lists increasing their chances of a space when needed. They were no longer on one central wait list but perhaps 10-15 in their area.

With incomes being so low here and cost of living being so high, the majority of parents are usually entitled to some help - although it might just be a few dollars. So suddenly most parents were entitled to financial assistance, all agency places were open to subsidized clients and it become common that every single agency approved day home was 100% subsidized children.

Of course, more and more in home providers wanted to become registered as most of their inquires were from parents needing a registered home. So much so, that this one agency couldn't possibly meet the requirements on them to support so many homes. This opened the door to more agencies being approved locally.

Soon there were two, then three - then four.

With each new agency, and with in-home carer's having a choice locally now, the business smart ones got creative to attract new homes. Bear in mind, agencies here get paid purely by the government not the providers or their clients. They get a set amount for each day home registered with their agency.

The newer agencies didn't enforce additional rules on their carer's. The newer agencies got creative in their ways of being supportive and helping their carer's.

Sadly, this original home has yet to wake up. Sure, they are not able to support any new carer's as they are maxed out but due to sites like this one, carer's are becoming more informed. They are gradually realizing that not all agencies are the same. As slowly, a few are moving agencies.

Sadly, I don't think this original agency will change and sadly I don't think they will lose enough in-home providers to make them think more but it's been a very long time since they have been approached by anyone seeking registered status.

However, their contracts and agreements with their in-home providers remain as they were. Some rules just restrict the business as the market has moved on.

Due to all of this, I am not surprised if there are some agencies which exist who do set the hours, activities, etc of their providers and until all providers are better informed, they will continue to do so.