Personal Insurance
Business Insurance
Industry
What Childcare Centre Insurance Covers
Childcare centre insurance covers the children in your care, the educators, the premises and the fee income of a long day care centre, a kindergarten, an occasional care service or a family day care scheme. The service is regulated, the people in it are the most vulnerable a business can serve, and insurers write it as its own class.
The claims follow the duty of care. A child is injured on play equipment, in a doorway or on an excursion. A parent alleges supervision failed. An allegation of abuse is made against a staff member, which many standard liability wordings exclude outright. Fire, storm or water damages the building and the service closes, and the fees stop while families go elsewhere.
Approved providers must meet the National Quality Framework and state licensing conditions, and the regulator can investigate a service after an incident. Public liability insurance is a condition of approval in practice, because the premises lease and the funding arrangements both require it. Business interruption insurance carries the service through a closure, and the indemnity period should allow for the time it takes to win families back.
Fortis Risk Solutions arranges childcare centre insurance for services across Australia from offices in Box Hill and Hawthorn, as part of our business insurance range. We look at the licence, the number of places, the building, the excursion program and the staffing before approaching insurers, and we place the abuse cover with a wording that responds rather than one that excludes.
Who this covers
Businesses in this group include:
- Long day care centres
- Kindergartens and preschools
- Occasional care and outside school hours care
- Family day care schemes and educators
- Early learning centre owners and landlords
If your business is not listed, ask us. The sections below are the starting point for any business in the group.
Childcare Centre Insurance: Cover Sections and Benefits
Childcare Centre Insurance FAQs
Public liability for the children and the premises, abuse liability written to respond, professional indemnity for the education and care delivered, and a business insurance package for the building, the fit-out and the fees lost after damage. Management liability covers the approved provider for regulatory investigations and employment claims. Workers compensation is compulsory and sits in a separate policy.
Usually not. Many public liability wordings exclude claims arising from abuse, or limit them to a small sub-limit. A childcare service needs a wording where abuse liability is written in, with a limit that reflects the service, and insurers will ask about working with children checks, supervision ratios, the child safe standards and the incident register before they offer it.
Under management liability insurance, where statutory liability and regulatory investigation costs are included. The approved provider can face a compliance direction, an infringement notice or a formal investigation after a serious incident, and the legal costs of responding can run for months. Fines are covered only where the law allows them to be insured, so the wording has to be checked.
Only where the policy says so. Public liability needs to extend to excursions, transport and community venues, and the bus needs commercial motor insurance with passenger liability. Family day care educators work from their own homes, so the scheme policy has to name the educators and their premises, or each educator holds cover the scheme approves.
Business interruption cover pays the lost gross profit and the fixed costs while the service cannot operate after insured damage, for the indemnity period in the schedule. A centre that closes for three months can lose families permanently, so the period should run past the reopening and cover the time it takes to refill the places.
Childcare wordings turn on abuse liability, supervision conditions, excursion extensions and how the regulator's requirements are met. FRS helps you disclose the licence, the places and the program accurately, structure limits to satisfy the lease and the funding body, compare insurers who write early learning risk and act as your advocate when a claim or an investigation arrives. Schools and other services for children sit under our community services insurance group.
Talk to a broker about Childcare Centre and Kindergarten Insurance
Call 03 7046 3766 on weekdays between 9:30am and 6pm, email admin@fortisrisksolutions.com.au, or send an enquiry and a broker from our Box Hill or Hawthorn office will come back to you about childcare centre and kindergarten insurance. Tell us what the business does and what the lease or contract asks for, and we take it from there.