$1.50 an Hour

[Country Kids]

There is a new 24/7 facility opening up in my area that will be charging $1.50 an hour! Here I was thinking of going with a flat day rate but now I'm double thinking because of this. I also just found out my friend who live in the very big city of our state is only charging $30 for sibling sets! She's booked with people wanting in. Happy for her but it makes me doubt myself for my business.

I so wish we could all just be on the same page with rates and not be undercutting each other. I really think that is worse then everyone having the same price and getting our moneys worth.

[My4SunshineGirlsNY]

How can anyone make a living on that??

[cheerfuldom]

well it is just too much to have only one rate schedule. There are a huge variety of services offered within daycares and some are much higher quality/lower ratios/more experienced providers. In general, the ones that I see in my area that are dirt cheap are for a reason.....bad part of town, newbie provider, huge ratio (or illegal ratio), nothing more provided than basic supervision aka lots of TV time

[Nickel]

It's the same as when I did online writing. People will try to undercut each other and it only hurts everyone! At those rates the people will burn out fast. Just do what is best for you and play up the quality of your service. Parents will soon realize that the cheapest provider is not always the best provider. And if that is all they care about, you probably don't want to deal with those parents anyway!

[BumbleBee]

There is a new 24/7 facility opening up in my area that will be charging $1.50 an hour! Here I was thinking of going with a flat day rate but now I'm double thinking because of this. I also just found out my friend who live in the very big city of our state is only charging $30 for sibling sets! She's booked with people wanting in. Happy for her but it makes me doubt myself for my business.

I so wish we could all just be on the same page with rates and not be undercutting each other. I really think that is worse then everyone having the same price and getting our moneys worth.

If I were you, I would go with a flat rate anyways. Play up what you offer. Some parents are more concerned with cost than they are with quality.

Generally speaking, dirt cheap daycares tend to be staffed with people who don't know what they are doing, limited programming and a lack of proper ratios. Not all of them are like that. In some cases it's a situation of the person doing daycare doesn't "need" the money. Everybody is different.

However, I worked for a daycare center that had the highest rates in the county. Higher rates didn't equal better in that case. The owner/boss was deeply in debt and unable to retire. We had staff who had degrees, a program that looked GREAT on paper (lack of supplies made the great program mediocre at best), and our ratios were out of whack.

In any case, you need to do what is best for you.

[DaisyMamma]

WOW!
$1.50/hr. That's crazy. You could make more $ collecting welfare.
$30/day for siblings?
How do people live on that?
I charge $40/day for one kid. But I'm only allowed 6 kids.

Stand your ground. Those people are going to burn out fast. Their program will suffer because of it.