Confused about the cost of childcare? Join the club! it's very difficult to get a clear idea about the real costs of care and with the media telling us everyday that prices are going up, up, up. It is a significant cause of stress for families nationally.
To help parents gain a better idea about the cost of care in their local area, we've developed and launched the CareforKids.com.au cost widget. A unique tool, which enables families to check the price of childcare centres by postcode.
The results are displayed instantly and offer an accurate representation of the average cost of centre based care in your area.
How does it work?
This highly dynamic and innovative tool is powered by the huge database of childcare providers listed with CareforKids.com.au.
Our system requires early childhood education and care providers to regularly update their fee information, which means that the data supplied by the widget is the best possible representation of current fees in that geographical area.
Our enormous database means that even if some providers don't supply us with their fee information, we're still able to generate an accurate cost estimation based on the information supplied by other providers in the area.
Compare and save
It's important to note that the figures generated are averages, enabling you to gain an indication and compare prices from postcode to postcode. You will need to drill down to individual provider level to learn exactly what providers charge, but much of this information is available on the CareforKids.com.au provider profiles.
The Cost Widget works by checking and averaging fees for centre based care in a nominated postcode. If there is no fee information available in that postcode the Widget widens out the search to include regional data.
The Cost Widget's national average is the average price for all childcare centres that have fee information published on CareforKids.com.au.
Please note, at this stage we have we focused on child care centres as this is by far the most sought after type of care in Australia.
To learn about the cost of care after government support has been taken into account, read our article on the Single Child Care Subsidy or use the CareforKids.com.au Child Care Subsidy Calculator here.
