Transport
If you choose to provide transport for the children at your service, you’ll need to know your responsibilities. Note that we do not fund transport arrangements – they are private arrangements between you and the children’s families.
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Services that provide transport to and from their centres should be aware of rules that they must follow. The ECE Funding Handbook and the Education (Early Childhood Services) Regulations 2008 have statutory requirements relating to sign-out and attendance checking that still apply.
- Service responsibilities
- Licensed hours and funding
- Accurate attendance records
- Signing a child in and out
- Safety checking and police vetting
- Providing transport during licensed hours
- Further information
Service responsibilities
The ECE service or kōhanga reo is responsible for developing practices for transportation that meet the health and safety needs of children, such as:
- ensuring appropriate adult-to-child ratios are maintained inside the vehicle
- making supervision arrangements for children in the vehicle while other children are being walked to their home/door
- making alternative arrangements if parents are not at home when children are dropped home
- providing parent contact details to the accompanying adult(s)
- practicing appropriate sign-in and sign-out procedures
- having a process to notify the adult(s) collecting children if a child will not attend
- having a process to ensure all children to be transported home are taken home at the correct time.
In addition, the driver must hold a current full New Zealand driver’s licence and the vehicle must meet NZ Transport Agency regulations.
Details of these health and safety practices should be provided to parents either at the time of enrolment or prior to transportation commencing. Parents should also be informed of:
- who the adult(s) accompanying the children will be, including any qualifications they hold (teaching, first aid)
- whether adult(s) accompanying the children have been safety checked or police vetted.
Licensed hours and funding
As transport is not part of the regulated service, funding from the Ministry cannot be claimed for the time a child is being transported. This means that enrolment forms should not cover the period of time in which children are being transported for attendance.
Accurate attendance records
Any service that has someone other than a parent/guardian regularly dropping off and collecting a child will need to put a process in place to ensure that parents/guardians are regularly examining and confirming the attendance record. This process is a requirement of the ECE Funding Handbook.
- Attendance records should accurately record when a child is attending the service.
- This is especially important in emergencies so a service knows who is on the premises.
- If your service provides transportation, you must adapt your record-keeping process.
Signing a child in and out
No regulations or criteria govern who can sign a child in, it can be done by whoever is dropping them off.
Signing a child out from a service must be done by the child’s parent/guardian or, a person who has gained the written consent of the parent/guardian to collect their child. Regulation 58 of The Education (Early Childhood) Regulations 2008 requires a service to obtain this written consent.
Safety checking and police vetting
As transport is not part of the regulated service, the Children’s Act 2014 requirement to safety check the adult(s) accompanying the children does not apply. However, it would be best practice to safety check those adults or obtain a police vet for them if this has not already been done.
Providing transport during licensed hours
Providing transport during licensed hours (for excursions) is covered by the following ECE licensing criteria:
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