Childcare.co.uk Review | The Easy Way to Find Local Childcare

Childcare.co.uk Review | The Easy Way to Find Local Childcare

Before having children of my own, I used to work as a nanny. I started that line of work at a young age and loved it as I’ve always loved children and been interested in child development.

I’m from Sweden and back home, I found the families I worked for through word of mouth and personal recommendations which was great but not always easy if you don’t know many people where you live.

I’ve lived in the UK now for nearly 10 years and until about a month before the birth of my first daughter in 2014, I worked as a nanny here in the UK too. I didn’t know many people here other than my now husband and his family and friends at the time so finding work in the childcare industry was a bit different.

I headed online to see if there was anywhere I could advertise my services and skills to find a suitable family to work for and I soon found Childcare.co.uk which is an award-winning online social networking platform for parents, childcare providers and private tutors. The site has over 1,800,000 members which is great! I signed up for my free account and created a profile with my education details and childcare experience and what kind of position I was looking for and soon parents contacted me to arrange interviews.

It was all a really good experience and I found it easy to discuss job details with potential employers. I soon found a lovely local family that I worked with for a few year and even travelled to Canada with to stay with them for a month there when they moved back there. We’re still friends today!

After that, I updated my profile again and a few more nice families got in touch and I soon worked for them until it was time for me to have my own baby.

Now, I’m a mum of two with another baby on the way and I currently don’t employ anyone to look after our kids as I’m working from home but it is likely to be needed in the future and I know where I’ll look for local childcare then — Childcare.co.uk. I’ve been asked to check out the website from a parent’s point of view and it’s very straightforward and simple.

When you arrive at the start page, you fill in what your looking for — a nanny, for example, and your postcode too to list the profiles of suitable people near you. You can narrow down the search results by where they live (within a 5 mile radius, for example) and by their skills, qualities and specialties. You can search by things like: full-time nannies, part-time nannies, live in nannies, live out nannies, nanny/housekeepers, Ofsted registered ones, with DBS checks and First Aid Training. You can narrow down your search to nannies with special needs experience, newborn experience or Montessori trained ones and much, much more. There are so many options which really helps narrow down the results to find someone who ticks all the boxes for you.

The childcare providers’ profiles show a photo of them along with some details like how far away they are from you, if they are a non-smoker, how long they’ve been a member of Childcare.co.uk, when they last updated the profile and when they last logged in.

The profile also shows a summary of what kind of position they are looking for, an About Me section, their experience, qualifications and availability in the form of a quick to read weekly schedule. You’ll also find fee details and any documents they might have uploaded, like proof of qualifications and checks.

At the bottom, you’ll see reviews and star ratings from previous employers which is my favourite bit as this gives you a good insight to what other parents think of the childcare provider.

As a parent, you can also choose to have a free account to make a profile or upgrade to a gold membership. The difference is that with the free account, you have to wait for a response to your profile. As a gold member, you can initiate contact with all other members and get talking to potential employees straight away. You can also make your other contact details, like your phone number, visible for free members to see for even faster connections. There are more features of the gold membership and you can see the details here.

If you’re looking for childcare, tutors or even a private midwife near you, definitely check out Childcare.co.uk. I’m sure you’ll find what you’re looking for in no time!

Collaborative Post.