Child Care offers process
The Process
Child Care Services commence their end of year re-enrolment process from August to September.
Services will provide the DCCCRS with a list of siblings that will be in the priority 1 cohort. DCCCRS confirms the date the siblings were registered to the service. Siblings who are not registered risk the chance of not getting a place. Siblings are then placed at the service. Services will then provide the DCCCRS with final number of vacant places to be allocated to the waiting list.
Offers are made between October and November to begin in January the following year.
Making Child Care Offers
The family of the child who is next on the waiting list that their age range is suitable for the vacant place at the service will be called via phone. The family will be offered the vacant place.
If the family doesn’t answer the phone call:
- The offer will be generated by the HH system,
- An email from the registration team will be sent to the family with
- The service name
- The room name and age range
- Which days the offer is for
- The family will have 48hours (2 business days) to accept or decline the offer.
Acceptance of offers
If a family accepts the offer they will receive an email within 1 business days confirming the service, the room name and the days that they have accepted a place.
The service will be blind copied into that email so they have the exact same information that the families have received.
Once families have been placed at the service they are not required to access their Hubhello account unless they are adding another child to the system.
Decline or refusal of offers
To ensure that the waiting list has families that are actively looking for care, families will only have the opportunity to refuse 2 offers in the time they are on the waiting list.
Families who decline the first offer will be returned to the waiting list with notes attached to their registration of the service they declined and the reasons why.
Families who decline the second offer will have the following 2 options:
- Change the date of registration to the current date of the decline.
- Withdraw their registration from the DCCCRS system.
No responses to the offers
If there is no response to the offer after the two working days(48hours)
The registration team will:
- contact the families via phone, sms and email with a 24 hour timeline.
- If there is no response the offer will be withdrawn and the registration will be archived.
- An email will be sent to the family advising them their waitlist registration has been archived due to no response.
The families will need to make contact with the registration team to reinstate their registration to the date they make contact with the team. It will not be back dated to the original date.
Eligibility – Priority of Access
DCCCRS follow the Victorian Department of Education Early Childhood Education Priority of Access outlined below as Priority 2,3,4.
DCCCRS follow the locally agreed criteria with the 8 participating services Priority of Access outlined below as Priority 1:
| Priority |
Criteria |
Description |
|
Priority 1
|
Siblings |
A child who has a sibling that is currently attending the Child Care service
A child who has a sibling that has been placed in the Integrated 3-year-old or 4-year-old kindergarten program for the following year.
|
| Priority 2 |
Children at risk of abuse or neglect, including children in Out-of-Home Care
|
A child that is referred by:
- Child Protection
- Child and family services (family services referral and support team, Child FIRST/integrated family services/Services Connect case worker)
- Maternal and Child Health nurse, or
- Out-of-Home Care provider
|
| |
Child identified by parent, career or legal guardian as: |
Aboriginal
Torres Strait Islander
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander
|
| |
Asylum seeker and refugee children |
An appropriate visa identifies the child and/or parents as a refugee or asylum seeker.
|
| |
Children with diverse learning needs are defined as children who:
- Require additional assistance in order to fully participate in the child care program or
- Require a combination of
- support services or
- Have an identified specific disability or
- Developmental delay
|
The child:
- Holds a Child Disability Health Care Card
- Has previously been approved for:
- The National Disability Insurance
- Scheme
- Early Childhood intervention Service
- Or referred by
- Maternal and Child Heath nurse
- Other support agencies
|
| |
Concession card holders |
A child or parent who holds a relevant concession card.
|
| |
Multiple birth children |
Identified on their birth certificate as being a multiple birth triplets or more |
| Priority 3
|
Sole parent |
A child of a sole parent who satisfies the activity test through paid employment or study
|
| Priority 4
|
Darebin residents
|
|
| Priority 5
|
Non-Darebin residents
|
|
The waiting list
HubHello arranges the registration onto a centralised list, taking into account the following factors:
- The age of the child
- The room the child is eligible to be in
- Priority of access criteria
- The date the registration was submitted on HH
Child Care Only Waitlist as of 28 February 2025
| Suburb |
|
|
0 – 1 years |
1 – 2 years |
2 – 3 years |
3 – 4 years |
4 – 5 years |
Total |
| Reservoir |
|
45 |
42 |
47 |
33 |
44 |
211 |
| Preston |
|
53 |
57 |
63 |
55 |
55 |
283 |
| Thornbury |
|
82 |
104 |
139 |
80 |
47 |
452 |
| Northcote |
|
102 |
137 |
155 |
115 |
94 |
573 |
| Total (28/2/2025) |
|
282 |
340 |
404 |
283 |
210 |
1519 |
The Child Care enrolment process at the service
Services will begin contacting families to start the Child Care Services enrolment process with the families that have been placed by DCCCRS.
This process may commence in October through to December. Families are advised to reach out the service if they haven’t heard from them. Families will need to provide the Child Care Service with the following information:
- the child’s name and address and details of any special needs
- information about the families and any other parents, carers or guardians in the child’s life
- details of people who can collect the child
- the child’s birth certificate or other identity documents
- the child's medical health and immunisation status (see immunisation section)
- details of any parenting orders or legal matters to do with the care or safety of your child.
Families are encouraged to read all the enrolment forms carefully and provide all required information. There may be fees or charges that can be charged to you if you don’t meet the obligations to the Child Care service
If you don’t understand anything on the forms, ask the Child Care Service to explain it to you.
Immunisation
'No Jab No Play'
Under the No jab no play rule, a child will need to be immunised and families will need to show the child’s immunisation history statement.
Learn more about 'No Jab No Play' at vic.gov.au/child-immunisation(opens in a new window).
The Darebin Immunisation Service may be able to help families go to: www.darebin.vic.gov.au/immunisation.
Phone: 8470 8562
Hours: 9.00am to 4.00pm, Monday to Friday
Email: immunise@darebin.vic.gov.au
Darebin Child Care Centralised Registration(PDF, 307KB)
Complaints about the process
The Darebin Child Care Central Registration Team welcomes feedback from services, families and carers about their experience using the Child Care Central Registration Scheme
You can provide feedback at any time by calling or emailing the team.
Every year, our team reviews the DCCCRS to make sure we are providing the best service possible.
At the end of the registration period, we’ll send a survey to all families and child care providers, so they can give us feedback. Darebin City Council has procedures and policies in place to respond to any complaints regarding dissatisfaction with the Council level and quality of service
More information
If you would like to speak to someone about the allocation process, please contact us:
Darebin Registration Team
Phone: 03 8470 8825
Email: registration.kindergartenchildcare@darebin.vic.gov.au