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I am starting a new dayhome and am considering doing a 24hr dayhome. There are a lot of dayhomes in my area but there is a real shortage of care that extends beyond the typical 7-5 day. What I am unsure of is what I should be charging for care that may include nights. Does anyone else have a dayhome that takes children over the night or late, what do you charge?
There are a couple in my area that offer the service. What you would have to find out is what is required in terms of supervision. If an adult must be awake while the children are in care then you might want to revamp the service to just offering evening/overnight care and then using the daytime hours for sleeping yourself. I would mean working 2 of the three shifts either doing day and evening or evening and overnight or overnight and day which I think would be the hardest. If you are going to go to the trouble of offering the additional service might as well make it for the hours that most don't do which would be the evening and overnight shifts. Without help not sure you could do the full 24 hours unless you are allowed to sleep.
I totally see the need for this type of care in my area too, but I am unaware as to the requirements for supervision. As playfelt stated, if a caregiver were required to be awake, I would reconsider the 24 hours approach.
I assume you would have someone helping you. Don't forget that you do need personal time, both to get things done (grocery shopping, haircuts, etc) and to relax and de-stress. When will you spend time with family or go out to dinner? I found even having kids here until 7 or 8 at night was draining and cut into my personal time an incredible amount. Just be careful that you don't burn yourself out working constantly.
I would not offer 24 hour care, simply for the above reasons. Between the different families, you could easily end up working virtually non-stop. If you do want to offer something unique, then evening or overnight care only would likely make sense if there is demand for it in your area. Check into your local regulations as well, since providing care outside of "normal" hours may mean different rules/guidelines. And before you do it, think EVERY possible scenario through. What will you do if a child is wakeful, or sick, etc? Will you provide food? Supper and breakfast? And so on....