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Childcare Centers of All Sizes Trust This Platform to Manage Payments, Families, and Engagement

Manage Payments Families And Engagement For Your Childcare Business
Mike Senecal

Writer: Mike Senecal

Mike Senecal

Mike Senecal, Staff Writer

Mike Senecal draws on more than 20 years of editorial experience to update CardRates.com readers on industry trends, business news, and best practices in budgeting and credit use. Mike has worked for decades in academic and trade publishing, including roles as managing editor and technical editor at the University of Florida and as contributor to finance industry publications, including Surety Bond Quarterly and Independent Agent, among others. Mike holds bachelor’s and master’s degrees from the University of South Carolina, and he enjoys bringing his years of academic and industry expertise online to help consumers of diverse financial backgrounds.

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Lillian Guevara-Castro

Editor: Lillian Guevara-Castro

Lillian Guevara-Castro

Lillian Guevara-Castro, Senior Editor

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Ashley Fricker

Reviewer: Ashley Fricker

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Ashley Fricker, Senior Editor

Ashley Fricker has more than a decade of experience as a finance contributor and editor, and has specialized in the credit card industry since 2015. Her credit card commentary is featured on national media outlets that include CNBC, MarketWatch, Investopedia, and Reader's Digest, among many others. She has worked closely with the world’s largest banks and financial institutions, up-and-coming fintech companies, and press and news outlets to curate comprehensive content and media. Ashley holds a bachelor's degree in multimedia journalism from Florida Atlantic University.

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In a Nutshell: Staffing is among the most daunting challenges facing the American childcare industry. The last thing a childcare center needs to worry about is collecting funds for the children in its care. Procare Solutions is a leading provider of childcare management software. It provides centers ranging from household size to enterprise-level with seamless invoicing, payment processing, classroom management, and family engagement products. Centers choosing Procare signal to families that their priorities are in the right place, earning Procare our Editor’s Choice™ Award.

We were all children once, but time and place make every childhood experience unique. One thing that never changes about raising children is the caregiver’s obligation of love. But everything else seems to change constantly.

For example, Americans emerged from the COVID-19 pandemic into an economy with higher prices for everything from groceries to single-family homes. Today’s economy makes childrearing as challenging as ever, pressuring households to invest in childcare to preserve earning power.

It’s the latest change in an industry that has been experiencing one thing after another since the COVID-19 shutdowns began in early 2020.

Centers struggled with closures and reduced enrollment during the pandemic. They continue to struggle with staffing.

They have also reaped the benefits of unprecedented state and federal support for childcare while responding to changing living patterns with more flexible models.

Centers must manage regulatory change and industry consolidation while support for universal pre-K programs in the states increases, promising more public involvement in the future.

They must do this while ensuring children have safe places to learn and receive nurturing while their caregivers work — all while earning a profit.

Procare Solutions logo

It’s not an easy job, but Procare Solutions makes it easier for more than 37,000 childcare centers with operations that range in size from a few children under care to the nationwide enterprise level.

Procare helps childcare centers, before-and-after-school programs, youth organizations, and shared services organizations manage and track all aspects of their business. It organizes family information, tracks attendance, automates tuition collection, and ensures families stay in the loop and are engaged.

More than 70% of American childcare centers trust Procare to handle the details of operating a childcare center efficiently and effectively. In a world of change, Procare remains dedicated to connecting childcare centers through technology and customer service to enable more of them to engage with and grow their population.

It’s an end-to-end approach that allows centers to focus on the precious potential of the young people in their care and earns Procare our Editor’s Choice™ Award.

“We’re the only true all-in-one solution for childcare centers,” said Tammie Hogan, Procare’s Chief Customer Officer. “We do it all to make it seamless and easy for everyone.”

Overseeing the Entire Childcare Journey

The foundation of the Procare platform is its Child Care Management Software, which includes essential center management tools.

Procare’s 100% flexible onboarding process ensures customers control options and fees. Multiple organizations within Procare walk customers through every option and configure the software to their requests.

Financial and staff management tools feature prominently. Procare handles critical financial responsibilities through robust accounting capabilities, including billing, invoicing, and payroll. Staff management tools allow users to manage payroll and scheduling more efficiently.

Contactless check-in and check-out is a recent innovation inspired by the pandemic that provides safer drop-offs and pickups. The feature is part of Procare’s attendance-tracking tools, which record and maintain updated information across each child’s daily journey.

Some centers wanted to take temperatures before children came in during the pandemic. Procare created a way for them to upload that information, too.

Procare Child Management System
Procare monitors all children currently in care from room to room.

A lead management component enables families to provide contact details and describe their care needs. The system then manages the lead as it moves and transforms into an active account.

The tool allows centers to understand what families are asking for and manage leads according to the offerings appropriate to each family’s needs.

“Our lead management component introduces a lot of efficiencies,” Hogan said. “In the olden days, a family would just show up at the door of a childcare center and ask for a tour, which was super slow.”

New families can easily register online using Procare’s automated process. Tools for meal planning, managing documents, business planning, and reporting assist the platform in managing federal and state compliance challenges.

For example, Procare can monitor staff-to-child ratios from room to room across an organization with multiple locations.

“Procare stays very close to those government regulations and state-by-state changes so we can support them,” Hogan said. “In some states, we’ve built connections that centers can use to feed required data directly to the regulators that need it.”

Flexible Payments Save Time and Resources

Procare assumes responsibility for classroom management, which can mean many things. It tracks attendance and room movement, assists with lesson planning, supports lesson sharing, and tracks developmental milestones according to state early childhood education standards. It aligns with state standards and includes copious curricular materials to back that up.

Procare instills trust as a family engagement manager through student-family-teacher communication, involving parents in their children’s activities and providing safety and security reassurances.

But Procare shines brightest as a payment processor. Procare helps simplify center operations through integrated invoicing, billing, and payment tools that use a unified dashboard without third-party software. It’s the only platform in the space that offers first-party payment processing and the largest designed specifically for childcare centers.

Procare billing software
Procare modernizes payments in the childcare industry.

Automated invoicing and billing allow centers to save time and resources with fewer data entry errors, better payment/account status visibility, and no need for manual reconciliation.

Transaction fees are low, with several one-time and autopay billing and payment options available. For example, centers may bill based on attendance and automatically add late fees to past-due accounts.

Integrated tuition payments make that crucial aspect of childcare payments easier for parents. The system accepts ACH payments, credit cards, and debit cards.

“In reviews, our customers celebrate that they no longer have to create manual invoices or chase parents for payments,” Hogan said.

Parents can pay via desktop, mobile app, or check-in/card reader, knowing that Procare prioritizes security and compliance. Multilayered security, PCI SOC 2 Type 2 certification, and Level 1 PCI compliance ensure users’ peace of mind.

Products regularly undergo rigorous independent third-party audits that review the implementation of security controls and surrounding operations.

Institutions worldwide recognize these standards as benchmarks for properly handling credit card data, personally identifiable information, and nonfinancial sensitive information.

The platform includes data encryption and account and password authentication. Users may control access through role-based security authorization; complete change control auditing maintains system integrity. Procare meets all applicable state, federal, and international laws and regulations.

“Procare’s payment processing integration allows for a lot of flexibility,” Hogan said. “You’re not going to find that flexibility if you use a different payment provider or cash and checks.”

Focus on the Children in Your Care

Interviewing Hogan for this story in the summer of 2024 made us realize that the world is approaching five years since the onset of COVID-19.

In a stubbornly inflationary economy, large childcare enterprises are acquiring small mom-and-pop businesses in what must be setting a record for consolidation in the industry.

No matter how new customers arrive, Procare’s consultative approach to service starts with an onboarding process that usually requires approximately two hours.

Hogan said the team first sets up billing, invoicing, and payment collection because that’s most important to most clients. Functionality for student check-in and check-out, room assignments, and managing leads is also very popular.

Comprehensive online support resources include videos, guides, training opportunities, and FAQs.

Tammie Hogan
Tammie Hogan is Procare’s Chief Customer Officer.

The team is always there to make the installation work. Procare prides itself on offering one-on-one support, just a phone call, live chat, or email away — all the support and training its customers need to succeed with the software.

“On the payment side, we have folks who can help one-on-one with everything from a bank change to changing fees — and that’s super specialized,” Hogan said.

Consistently high ratings on popular review sites attest to Procare’s ability to meet and exceed diverse customer expectations.

In addition to striving to meet typical business KPIs, Procare tracks customer success through surveys and eagerly awaits customer comments on review sites.

Procare also tracks software usage, including payment processing dollars. Predictive indicators reveal usage changes in particular areas, including payment processing amounts and the mix of ACH and credit.

Meanwhile, state involvement in the childcare industry has staying power, with more state constituencies supporting universal pre-K programs. Procare keeps childcare businesses ready with reports for auditors and interfaces closely with states to ensure public dollars find a productive use within the system.

“It’s super important that Procare tracks that,” Hogan said. “Our customers know we’re prepared on both the software and the payment side.”