Throughout the many years I’ve been working with Kidsoft I’ve had the opportunity to meet many extraordinary and engaged people, they’re all driven by the same unique spirit. All passionate about early childhood development. Powerful. Impactful. Proud of who they are. Proud of the industry they are in. Proud of what they’ve accomplished. I am very pleased to celebrate this pride by bringing together our community, Kidsoft’s community, of exceptional, inspiring educators.
We’re here to help with your end of financial year…
We know this end of financial year is a little different, and we want to help you feel prepared for whatever is around the corner. Kidsoft’s CFO, Di, sat down with Cass, from our Customer Success team, to compile a list of tips and advice to get your business end of financial year ready. Watch the video and review the summary of tasks below.
Tip #1
Review your parent debtors for those that may have become “bad debts” (families that you are not going to be able to get to pay at all), ensure you look at both your “active” and “inactive” debtors for those that you might need to write off, you can do this by accessing the Aged Balances Report within Kidsoft.
Tip #2
When your accountant or bookkeeper asks you to give them your financial reports for the year, for instance your financial summary report or your financial detailed report, we would suggest waiting until after the 13th July 2020 when free childcare ends before running those reports as you may have unsubmitted attendances that weren’t submitted by the 6th of April, when the Federal Government brought in free childcare. Additionally, you might have attendances that may need adjustments and require a variation to be submitted. Once you are happy with your attendances and you have submitted them all, you can then run a Financial Summary or Financial Detail Report within Kidsoft.
Tip #3
The Federal Government have put transition payments in place from the 13th July to the 27th September 2020, as a result services are unable to increase their fees in July as what has become common place. However, if you wish to increase your fees post 27th September 2020, you can do this now ahead of time in Kidsoft by pre-populating changes to your fees with a scheduled go live date in the future.
Tip #4
The 2020/21 financial year rates for CCS have already been released and these have been updated within the Kidsoft platform to apply from the 13th July 2020. If you wish to give your families their Customer Account Statements in advance so they know what their gap fee payment will be post Free Childcare you can estimate this by running a Customer Account Statement in Kidsoft now.
Tip #5
It’s that time of the year to remind your families to put their new income estimates into their MyGov accounts for the 2020/21 financial year. Families also need to confirm their income for the first time for CCS for the 2018/19 financial year, this is done by either having lodged your tax return for that year or by going onto the MyGov portal and letting the ATO know you don’t need to lodge one, if this is not done by the 13th July 2020, CCS payments will cease. Once a family has estimated their income for the new financial year there is a possibility that their CCS entitlements may change, if their circumstances have changed. A good tip is to look out for the CCS entitlement notifications on the front screen of Kidsoft, you can see these in more detail also in the CCS Entitlement Variation Report. Further also remind your families that CCS balancing will occur once their 2019/20 financial year income tax return is lodged comparing their actual income to their previous estimate.
Tip #6
It’s a great time to start thinking about budgets and what KPIs you would like to set for your business for the new financial year. The Kidsoft KPI Report will help to provide reporting on these key metrics including utilisation, revenue, debtors, and much more.
Tip #7
One of our favourite settings in Kidsoft is Balance Lock, this setting “Locks” your transactions to a particular period, and prevents new transactions been entered once the period has been “Locked”. This is to ensure that reports you use to assist things like End of Month reporting or lodging your BAS Statements and your income tax return, your numbers won’t change.
For more advice, or assistance on preparing your business for the end of the 2020 financial year please don’t hesitate to reach out to our Customer Support team.
We know that many of you operate your services in Drought and Fire affected communities, you may have seen that the Government has released additional funding for Childcare services that may be drought affected.
We encourage all Kidsoft customers who are in these communities to apply for grant funding of up to $10,000 (excluding GST) under the Community Child Care Fund (CCCF) special circumstances grant opportunity.
If any service is unsure how to complete the application, please contact us at Kidsoft and we can put you in touch with an organisation that can assist with this.
Fact sheets, and grant application forms are available on the CCCF special circumstances drought support page.
Additionally, the ATO has also released guidance for affected services, that will allow more time to lodge and pay compliance obligations, such as BAS statements and will waive penalties and interest etc. You can contact the ATO on 1800 8026 218 or visit their website.
If your service is facing financial pressure due to the drought or fires, please contact us at Kidsoft to discuss your Kidsoft fees and how we can assist.
We at Kidsoft are here to support our customers, as we are all part of the overall Kidsoft Family so please reach out if you need support in any way.
Working together with Storypark for maximum learning has been a genius move for Kidsoft. Over 100,000 professional teachers and families in 23 countries are benefitting from this online learning tool and we can see why.
Storypark offers an amazing opportunity to follow a child’s learning journey and see progress with all the family joining in. This is an incredible online platform where teachers and families can share videos, images and audio. Android and IOS even allow members to go live.
Teachers are able to check a child’s work before publishing it and also within your team share and chat privately. Directors and head teachers can be invited as mentors which can only encourage a child’s capability.
We love the idea that curriculums can be chosen and also subjects so there are options to create a new framework or adapt an existing one.
There is no need to get new technology if you have an android device or IOS you can use Storypark anywhere.
Reports can be made so a child’s progress can be followed closely and teachers and parents can see where the children shine and what they like the most. This is also a brilliant planning tool for future frameworks.
Storypark allows huge family involvement so that parents can keep and follow records of their child from toddler throughout their young education. Teachers can also feel the support and back of families as they work together to help to develop to the maximum the education of Australia’s next generation.
At Kidsoft we are proud to be in collaboration with search a powerful online anywhere learning platform that we have no doubt will become an institution, and of course extremely delighted to be working together with Storypark for maximum learning.
Alongside our vast collection of CSM’s Software and our experience of over 25 years we believe we have it all to make any childcare business a great success for everyone.
Contact one of our highly experienced team at Kidsoft for any information regarding set up, consulting, improving and existing business or just a simple enquiry.
Storypark, a certified Kidsoft partner, allows you to record and communicate learning as it happens within a secure online environment. Learn more about Storypark and how they can assist your business by clicking here.
