Compliance Bulletin

Educator to child ratios for family day care services  regulations 124(5) and 153(1)(ma)

August 2025

From 1 June 2024, approved providers have been required to detail circumstances on their family day care (FDC) register where they have approved an educator to educate and care for more than seven children, or more than four children who are preschool age or under, at any one time, due to exceptional circumstances.  The details, must include the:

• nature of exceptional circumstance
• date of when approval was granted by the approved provider
• name of person who granted the approval
• date of birth and name of each child educated and cared for as part of the approval
• period which the FDC educator is approved to educate and care for more than seven children, or for more than four children who are preschool age or under.

ECRU have received several complaints regarding the use of exceptional circumstances, including some cases where this practice may pose a risk to children, and/or is being used as a standard enrolment practice. Under regulation 124(6) of the Education and Care Services National Regulations 2012 (the National Regulations) exceptional circumstances only exist if:

• all the children being educated and cared for by the family day care educator are siblings in the same family, or
• a child is in need of protection under child protection law and the family day care educator is the best person to educate and care for the child, or
• the family day care residence or approved family day care venue (not the principal office location) is in a rural or remote location and no alternative care is available. Location is based on the  Accessibility/Remoteness Index of Australia (ARIA) and should be confirmed by accessing Remoteness Areas | Australian Bureau of Statistics.

ECRU would like to remind approved providers:

• You must contact other services in the area to confirm that there are no vacancies available. Evidence of this contact should be kept to justify the decision to approve exceptional circumstances and should include details of the service name, who provided the information and on what date.
• Exceptional circumstances must not be granted because of a preference to attend a certain FDC educator if other vacancies exist in the area.
• If an educator is not located in a rural or remote area and an approved provider can evidence that there is no alternative education and care available, a waiver may be an option however, this can only be obtained via an application to ECRU with evidence to support the grounds for the waiver.

Approved providers must consider the risks of an educator having more than the maximum number of children in their care. Best practice should include the completion of a documented risk assessment with consideration of factors such as:

• the educators’ qualifications and experience
• the physical environment and location
• the ages and needs of the children
• if the educator has an educator assistant
• the length of time additional children are in attendance.

ECRU will be collecting this information as part of their upcoming FDC register request and may seek further information from approved providers who have approved exceptional circumstances. More information can be found in the Guide to the National Quality Framework on pages 442-443.