Anne Rabbitte (Galway East, Fianna Fail)
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595. To ask the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs to outline the position regarding the treatment of booking deposits for childcare providers; the circumstances in which they must return same to parents; if the requirement to return such deposits applies to children availing of ECCE services only or also applies to children in full-time care; if there has been a change of policy in recent months whereby providers are now also required to return deposits to parents of children in full-time care; the basis for such a change; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [42397/18]

Katherine Zappone (Dublin South West, Independent)
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The Early Childhood Care and Education (ECCE) programme is fully funded by my Department and the rule in relation to the return of booking deposits relating to ECCE services remains unchanged.

"Booking deposits may be taken from parents provided such booking deposits are no more than four times the weekly capitation fee applicable to the pre-school service. The deposit must be repaid in full to the parents once the child’s registration has been approved on PIP."

This rule means that the maximum ECCE deposit that can be held is €258.

If a service is holding a deposit that exceeds this amount for a child that has already been attending the service prior to commencement of ECCE, depending on the level of ECCE service they must return up to €258 to the parent/guardianonce the child has been registered for ECCE on the Programme Implementation Platform (PIP) system.

The purpose of this clause is to prevent an over payment of exchequer funding, because if a child leaves a service provider unexpectedly, my Department will continue to pay their ECCE funding for 4 weeks.

It must be noted that my Department is not the owner/employer of Early Years services; they are private businesses and their policy on deposits relating to levels of service not funded by my Department, including full time care, are a matter between the service provider and the individual parent.