Transportation. Is It Worth It?
So I have an in home daycare but will be starting a center soon. I get calls pretty frequently asking if I transport kids. It would also be nice to be able to take the kids on field trips. There's also the added bonus of having a second car since right now my husband and I share a car and I have meetings during the day on the 2nd and 4th Wednesday of each month that I always have to borrow a car for. But I do know that there's the added insurance expense and car payment (our current car is paid off) so I'm wondering if it's worth it. What do you think?
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A commercial auto policy was super expensive when I looked into it. Definitely not worth it for me, but each state may be different.
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Originally Posted by missT: Could you look into bussing in your area for field trips? My local bus company contracts for field trips and stuff at the center that I used to be employed at. |
As a parent it was #1 priority for me to find a center that could transport my SA child home from school.
Field trips were low on my priority list. Every family is different, I am sure you can fill your spaces if you don't offer transportation. I don't know anything about the expense, but I imagine it is huge. Unless you have a very large center, I think it'd be hard to justify the added expense. |
Originally Posted by missT: Some states might require you get a commercial license to transport. I know here, If I worked with the disabled community, I have to get an addition on my license before I could drive just a regular 7-8 seater van for the center |
In my city it wouldn't be worth it. The commercial auto insurance is expensive and in my county we need a special transporting permit if we are picking up or dropping clients off somewhere. I only take the kids with me when dropping off my own children but don't pick up or drop off the DC kids at school or anywhere else so I don't need a permit but if I did the permit alone would cost somewhere around $9k a year. Check your own local city and county ordinances as well as state requirements.
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It was not worth the added insurance cost (both daycare and auto) in my area and personally I would not want the hassle.
I do see the value for SA programs as most parents needing aftercare work full time and need the program to provide transportation - in my area it is only much larger centers that offer it. |
I transport kids. We do a lot of off-site activities and up until a couple years ago the school didn't bus pre-K. So it was transport kids or pretty much lose the 3-5 age group. Plus for the first few years DD was in school there were quite a few times I would have to go get her from school for health reasons. If I couldn't transport I would have to emergency find a sub or call DW and have her get off work 45 min away. Insurance wasn't cheap but reasonable. I can't remember the amount or how we did the policy (& frankly I'm being too lazy to go downstairs and open the file cabinet :lol:), but my insurance is already a mess because of the home daycare and my metalworking shop (my other business).
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