Setting up childcare policies.Introduction The provision of help with childcare is increasingly viewed as a valuable benefit by employees, as it assists them in balancing work and domestic responsibilities. On the employer's side, childcare assistance is seen as a means of attracting and retaining staff, improving motivation and reducing absenteeism ab·sen·tee·ism n. 1. Habitual failure to appear, especially for work or other regular duty. 2. The rate of occurrence of habitual absence from work or duty. . A progressive policy demonstrates corporate social responsibility and contributes towards equal opportunities objectives. National Occupational Standards for Management and Leadership This checklist has relevance for the following standards: B: Providing direction, units 11, 12 Definition A childcare policy is a voluntary scheme put into practice by the employer to provide, or to help to provide, care for the children of employees during working hours. The aim of such a policy is to enable primary carers to return to work despite childcare responsibilities. Care may be provided for children of all ages and can be implemented in a single scheme, or as a combination of a number of childcare options such as, workplace nurseries or childcare vouchers (see the Glossary A term used by Microsoft Word and adopted by other word processors for the list of shorthand, keyboard macros created by a particular user. See glossaries in this publication and The Computer Glossary. of terms). To comply with equal opportunities legislation, childcare provision has to be made available to both male and female employees. Action checklist 1. Examine the short term and long term needs of the firm for the provision of childcare Will a childcare policy benefit the organisation in the long term, justifying high initial costs? Is there a demand for a childcare policy? 2. Obtain the full commitment of top management to the implementation of a childcare policy and appoint a project team Without overt Public; open; manifest. The term overt is used in Criminal Law in reference to conduct that moves more directly toward the commission of an offense than do acts of planning and preparation that may ultimately lead to such conduct. OVERT. Open. commitment from the top, the policy has little chance of success. Establish who will be responsible for the implementation and management of the policy. This is important, as the implementation of a childcare policy is a long term commitment and quality of provision is essential. Consequently the individuals involved must be prepared to champion the scheme. A project team should be assembled as·sem·ble v. as·sem·bled, as·sem·bling, as·sem·bles v.tr. 1. To bring or call together into a group or whole: assembled the jury. 2. to collect and assess information and help formulate formulate /for·mu·late/ (for´mu-lat) 1. to state in the form of a formula. 2. to prepare in accordance with a prescribed or specified method. policy. This should include a member of the HR department. 3. Identify all the policy options available It is important to ensure that the implications of each option are thoroughly researched, including costs, legal costs, legal: see damages. regulations, which options are and are not available in the immediate locality 1. locality - In sequential architectures programs tend to access data that has been accessed recently (temporal locality) or that is at an address near recently referenced data (spatial locality). This is the basis for the speed-up obtained with a cache memory. 2. and the location of the workforce in relation to the workplace. Policy options include: Childcare allowances--are much cheaper than paying for nursery provision and can be used in the parents' local area. Parents are also able to choose the form of childcare they prefer but there is no guarantee that the allowance will be spent on childcare. Childcare vouchers--are subject to significant tax benefits for employers and employees (although childcare must be registered or approved for benefits to apply) and can purchase all forms of legal childcare. Vouchers can only be cashed in exchange for childcare and can be used in the parents' local area. Workplace nurseries--both parent and child are on site allowing access for parents to their children at lunchtimes or in emergencies. Tax relief is available to employers for the costs of providing a workplace nursery and capital allowances may be available. Buying places at local nurseries--start-up costs for employers are eliminated and nursery management responsibilities avoided. However, the location of nurseries may not be convenient for all. Childcare advisory service--usually provided by organisations to complement their other childcare support or can be offered as part of their general employee assistance programme. Can be a low cost option. 4. Consult employees Having decided which options would be practical to implement, present them to employees and survey their attitudes to the choices open to them. Which policy would they prefer and why? 5. Formulate policy Taking the views of employees into full account, and the requirements and preferences of the organisation, choose one, or a combination, of the options. 6. Draw up a business plan detailing policy Set time scales for implementation, and estimate implementation and ongoing costs. Ensure that regulations governing gov·ern v. gov·erned, gov·ern·ing, gov·erns v.tr. 1. To make and administer the public policy and affairs of; exercise sovereign authority in. 2. each method of childcare provision are adhered to and that all relevant organisations are kept informed of the implementation of policy. The scope of provision should be outlined in the plan. Establish the rate of any fees/allowances/contributions. If applicable, decide the range of hours provision will cover, and ascertain any limits in the numbers of employees who will be covered. 7. Launch the scheme Inform employees of the final childcare policy decision some time in advance of the scheme's launch, as many parents in work will already have made childcare arrangements with family, friends or providers of childcare in their area. After the launch, allow time for parents to adjust to the service, and for numbers of participants in the scheme to increase. 8. Review the scheme Assess and monitor standards continuously to ensure that childcare policies meet the needs of the organisation, the employees and their children. Glossary of terms Buying places in nurseries enables employers to provide their employees with guaranteed places in local nurseries for their children. In some cases the costs are absorbed by the organisation, in others they are passed on to the employee. Childcare allowances take the form of either cash or vouchers and are paid directly to the individual employee, either as an employer-paid benefit or increasingly as a voluntary benefit paid for by the employee through salary sacrifice. Childcare vouchers are a type of childcare allowance paid directly to the individual employee, often administered for an employer through a voucher A receipt or release which provides evidence of payment or other discharge of a debt, often for purposes of reimbursement, or attests to the accuracy of the accounts. provider. Vouchers can be offered within a flexible benefits plan as well as through the more popular payment arrangements described above (see childcare allowances). Flexible working means that the working hours for employees deviate from the 9-5 norm. Options include flexible working hours, term time working, job share schemes and voluntary reduced work time. Holiday/After school provision enables parents, who have children of school age and whose hours of work do not correspond with school times, to obtain care. These are often run by local councils, church groups, local clubs and societies, nurseries and increasingly schools. A government initiative is set to provide all school age children with school based care by 2010. Salary sacrifice is a scheme where employees agree to reduce their taxable salary by a certain amount to pay, for example, for childcare vouchers. Workplace nurseries are usually on site or located in nearby premises provided by the employer. They can be run in-house In-house In the context of general equities, keeping an activity within the firm. For example, rather than go to the marketplace and sell a security for a client to anyone, an attempt is made to find a buyer to complete the transaction with the firm. or by a contractor who specialises in nursery care provision. Some organisations work in partnership with another firm to provide nursery facilities, thus sharing the costs and management responsibilities. How not to manage setting up childcare policies Don't don't 1. Contraction of do not. 2. Nonstandard Contraction of does not. n. A statement of what should not be done: a list of the dos and don'ts. : * impose a policy on employees without consulting them * expect immediate, quantifiable Quantifiable Can be expressed as a number. The results of quantifiable psychological tests can be translated into numerical values, or scores. Mentioned in: Psychological Tests results Additional resources Book Childcare choices for families that work: a handbook
This article is about reference works. For the subnotebook computer, see .
London London, city, Canada London, city (1991 pop. 303,165), SE Ont., Canada, on the Thames River. The site was chosen in 1792 by Governor Simcoe to be the capital of Upper Canada, but York was made capital instead. London was settled in 1826. : Daycare Trust, BUPA BUPA n abbr (= British United Provident Association) → seguro médico privado Childrenatwork, 2003 This book is available for loan to members from the Management Information Centre. More information at: www.managers.org See .org. (networking) org - The top-level domain for organisations or individuals that don't fit any other top-level domain (national, com, edu, or gov). Though many have .org domains, it was never intended to be limited to non-profit organisations. RFC 1591. .uk/mic Journal articles Childcare support IDS HR Studies, no 799, Jan 2005 Flexible childcare provision: the options for employers, Alison Alison betrays old husband amusingly with her lodger, Nicholas. [Br. Lit.: Canterbury Tales, “Miller’s Tale”] See : Adultery Clarke Equal Opportunities Review, no 134, Oct, 2004, pp15-20 This is a selection of articles copies of which are available from the Management Information Centre. More information at www.managers.org.uk/mic Related checklists Introducing flexible working into your organisation (026) Work-life Balance The expression work-life balance was first used in 1986 in the US (although had been used in the UK from the late 1970s by organisations such as New Ways to Work and the Working Mother's Association) to help explain the unhealthy life choices that many people were making; they were (193) Internet Internet Publicly accessible computer network connecting many smaller networks from around the world. It grew out of a U.S. Defense Department program called ARPANET (Advanced Research Projects Agency Network), established in 1969 with connections between computers at the resources HM Revenue and Customs www.hmrc.gov.uk/childcare Information on the tax and national insurance treatment of employer-paid childcare Organisations Daycare Trust, 21 St George's Road St George's Road is a road in Southwark, London SE1 running between Westminster Bridge Road to the northwest and Elephant and Castle to the southeast. St George's Cathedral is on the north side and the Imperial War Museum is on the south side opposite, at the junction with , London, SE1 6ES Tel: 020 7840 3350 www.daycaretrust.org.uk Working Families, 1-3 Berry Berry, former province, France Berry (bĕrē`), former province, central France. Bourges, the capital, and Châteauroux are the chief towns. St, London, EC1V 0AA Tel: 020 7253 7243 www.workingfamilies.org.uk |
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