Communicating with Parents - CareforKids.com.au®

Communicating With Parents
Making a great impression over the phone for family day carers

We've received a number of queries from family day carers who use our Child Care Vacancy Alert service wanting to know the best way of making a good impression with prospective clients over the phone.

Remember, the phone is often the first point of contact parents have with a child care service so it's important to ensure that initial communication is helpful and has a positive impact.

Basic rules
As all family day carers know it can be difficult to answer the phone when you are minding children, so ensure you have a voicemail system with a helpful message prompting people to leave their details. Ensure you check your voicemails everyday and make follow up calls as soon as you can.

When you answer the phone clearly identify both the name of your service and your own name. If anyone else answers the phone ensure they are familiar with the protocol and make sure they either take a message or pass the phone on to you.

If you are too busy to talk to the parent at that moment, politely explain the reasons why and make a time to call back later in the day. If the parent is a current parent and the query is a quick one then try and make the time to answer then and there, it saves you the work later. If the parent is a new client take their details and call back as soon as you can.

When you take or return a call from a prospective client follow the guidelines below to ensure the parent receives all the information necessary to make an informed decision about whether to use your service and to boost your chances of making the sale:

Introduce yourself and the name of your business in a professional, friendly manner.
Tell the parent the ages of the children you care for.
Ask the parent what hours and days they need care and tell them the hours and days you offer care.
Ask the parent how soon they need care and if it's temporary or long term.
Explain the kind of program you offer and what activities the children participate in.
Let the parent know the daily routine, when the children eat, go outside, do group time, sleep etc. Be sure to ask whether they have any questions, often parents will want to know how their child's routine will work around your schedule.
Explain how mealtimes work and what parents need to supply in the way of food. It can also be helpful to explain your policies with regard to special dietary requirements, allergies and intolerances.
Make sure you take some time to talk about your qualifications, training and experience and explain your level of first aid certification.
State your fee clearly. Many parents want to know this information first up but are embarrassed to ask. Explain what is included (nappies, food etc) and what is not.
If possible tell the parent you will send out an information kit. Many child care services offer posted/emailed information kits and to be competitive you should consider offering the same.

A good information kit should contain

A small information leaflet containing a summary of your qualifications, philosophy and a brief description of hours, ages accepted, etc. This document doesn't need to be fancy, a simple A4 sheet of paper is fine.
A standard contract
A breakdown of your fees including hours of operation, registration fees and late charges policy.
A list of supplies for example, nappies, bottles and formula, spare clothes, cot sheets and so on. This will help parents compare costs.
A daily schedule including mealtimes, outside time, nap time, group time etc.
A menu if applicable
A thank you for your interest cover letter with a friendly and professional tone and contact details.
Be sure to send out the information pack immediately (this will be easier if you can email it) as it will convey a very professional approach.
Tell the parent to look over the information and call you back to set up an appointment.
If the parent wants to make an appointment with you immediately say you already have an appointment booked for the following Monday and offer them the Tuesday. This means that if for any reason you feel the family would not be a good fit for your service you can say that the Monday family took the spot, it also makes you look busy.

Remember that even the most fabulous family day carers in the world won't attract the business if they don't make a good impression. Investing some time to improve the quality and content of your phone calls will definitely pay off.

Parts of this article are reproduced from Kim Freitag's eHow article How to Give a Great Impression of Your In-home Daycare Business Over The Phone.