For companies interested in knowing more about the Out of School Care service and how it can benefit you and your employees.

Why do you need an out of school care programme?
Who else offers it?
How will your employees access the service?
How much of your time will it take up?
How much will it cost?
Can the service be linked to your EAP/Benefits supplier?
Is the service easy to implement?
Are there any Legal/Tax implications?
What next?

Why do you need an out of school care programme?
Childcare support for employees is a well recognised benefit. Companies are increasingly aware of the eldercare responsibilities of their employees. But probably the most stressful time as a working parent is when your children are of school age. As a parent with a big job you are relaxed most of the year until school holidays when suddenly your different responsibilities pull you in a hundred different directions and either your work or your children suffer.

There are hundreds of holiday clubs out there. But by their nature they are difficult to find and even more difficult to book online. With Out of School Care we simply got the biggest holiday club operators (and now an increasing number of smaller players) online and developed a simple seamless booking process. It means two things – parents have an easy to use accessible resource that can be booked from work and you, the employer, can help all your staff across the board irrespective of the age of their dependents.

Who else offers it?
No-one. The only other solution available is to run your own dedicated holiday clubs for your staff. That is ideal if you have enough staff in one location. If you do want to go down this route then please let us tender – our sister company, Tinies, is the UK's leader in crèches and holiday clubs provision.

How will your employees access the service?
We prefer to build you your own dedicated website with details of all your services and company specific information at www.myfamilycare.co.uk/yourcompanyname.
 
Emergency Childcare, Emergency Homecare and Out of School Care are all available online or via a 24/7 telephone booking team. We give you your own unique telephone number as part of the service. Information on all our other services can also be displayed on your dedicated website and we will work hard on your behalf to produce relevant eye catching marketing material. An initial phone call on your dedicated number or an email on your dedicated email address is the normal way for employees to access the Search & Guidance, Training and Helpline services. The more the services are used the better for all parties.

How much of your time will it take up?
As much or as little time as you want. There are various elements of the service that need discussing and agreeing: homepage and email copy; verification of users; a marketing and communication plan. But we've done this now for lots of clients and we really can take care of most things. For our best clients, the involvement is as simple as reading the user reports every month and promoting the service internally. From our end the service is completely seamless. Please allow a three week timeframe; four weeks if you want us to produce promotional material.

How much will it cost?
You can decide to contribute how much and in whatever format suits you and your employees. We charge for set up and management. The cost is dependent on the size of your company and whether you take any other services from us.

Please email us if you would like us to provide a cost calculator for your company.

Can the service be linked to your EAP/Benefits Supplier?
Yes, of course. It's easier, and we prefer, offering Out of School Care as a voluntary benefit but you are the client. You decide. We have already done lots of work to integrate the system with the major vouchers companies and have ongoing relationships with Thomson Online Benefits, Towers Perrin, Hewitt, and PMM.

Is the service easy to implement?
The complicated bit is deciding how much you would like to contribute. We can do some detailed work with you to decide how much we think you should contribute to maximize the benefit to you and your staff. But thereafter implementing it could not be easier. We do all the work and have plenty of easy templates for you to use. We have a team of developers constantly working on the site so in the extreme case one week's lead time would allow us to take a service live – not ideal but we have done it before.

Are there any Legal/Tax implications?
Tax – any company contributions you make, either for bookings or registrations, will be taxed as a P11D expense. We are happy to work within the requirements of your payroll department. You will need to decide whether the company or employee picks up this cost.

Legal – there are no legal implications implementing an out of school care service. The contractual relationship, and hence liability risk, is always between the employee and the care provider.

What next?
Please get in touch – we prefer meeting you face to face to run through how the service works, and how we can tailor it to meet your company needs. But a chat by phone can also work. Please allow at least 15 minutes. We are very proud of the service so we do sometimes run over.

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