Absences from child care

Absent sessions

If a child is absent from a booked session of care, you can offer their place to another child. You can also claim CCS for both sessions. However, you must follow the limits on places and educators outlined by the states and territories.

You can also offer discounted fees for absent sessions if:

• families provide advance notice
• you can fill the absent child’s place.

We encourage services to offer this flexibility of discounted fees to families. However, you will need to report the discounted fees to us so that we can calculate the correct CCS. We calculate the CCS based on the actual session fees that you charge families.

Types of absences

Allowable absences

Families can get CCS when their child is absent from a session of care they would normally attend for up to 42 days per child, per financial year.

These absences should generally occur between a child’s first physical attendance and/or their last physical attendance at your service to receive CCS. However, there are limited circumstances where some absences can be reported outside this period, referred to as absences at the start or end of an enrolment.

Families can use their allowable absence days for any reason. They don’t need to provide evidence.

Families can use their 42 allowable absences for short term travel overseas. However, families will stop being entitled for CCS after 6 weeks overseas until they return to Australia. Learn more about payments to families overseas.

In shared care arrangements, the allowable absences count is allocated to the child, not to each individual parent.

If a child is enrolled in more than 1 session of care on the same day (such as before and after school care) and is absent for 1 or both of those sessions, it is counted as 1 absence day.

On public holidays, you can report an absence if you close your service and you charge families a fee for this day. This will be considered an allowable absence and will be deducted from a family’s 42 allowable absences.

There are some circumstances where families can get CCS paid for allowable and additional absences at the start and end of an enrolment due to certain circumstances that occur during the extended period.

The extended period:

• begins 6 days before the child’s first attendance and ends on the first attendance day, or
• begins the day of the child’s last attendance and ends 6 days after the last attendance day.

The circumstances where families can get CCS for absences at the start and end of enrolment during the extended period include:

• the service has changed ownership during the child’s extended period, covering any absences during the service transition period
• the child’s usual service is closed and the child attends a different service, requiring a new enrolment under the same provider
• a family tragedy has occurred within the 28 days prior to the absence in the child’s extended period
• the enrolment was ceased incorrectly
• any of the additional absence reasons listed below.

A family tragedy could include, but is not limited to:

• serious injury, illness or death of an immediate family member
• the child’s carer ceases to be a member of a couple
• the child, a carer, or an immediate member of the family is a victim of a serious crime or domestic violence
• the child’s principal home is lost or sustains major damage.

Absences in the above circumstances are allowable absence reasons. CCS will only be paid for these reasons if the family has not exhausted their 42 allowable absences.

If a family has used their yearly allowable absences, additional absences can be claimed in the extended period if:

• it meets additional absences criteria, and
• any required evidence has been provided.

If the absence meets the criteria for both an allowable absence and an additional absence, select the additional absence reason in the Provider Entry Portal (PEP) to ensure the absence can be paid during the extended period. 

Additional absences

Families may be able to get additional absences once they have used their allowable absence days, in certain circumstances. A public holiday is not an additional absence reason.

These circumstances are:

Emergency absences

During a period of emergency, families won’t have to use their annual allocation of allowable absences.

Children who live or attend a service in an affected region will get extra allowable absences for the duration of the period of emergency.

These absences will be automatically applied in the Child Care Subsidy System if we declare a period of emergency.

After a period of emergency, families may receive additional absences if they have exhausted their annual allocation of allowable absences.

Reporting absences

You can report an absence in your session reports if:

• the child was enrolled in a session of care but did not attend, and
• the family has been charged a gap fee for that session of care.

You cannot report absences when your service is closed, except on a public holiday by law or during a period of emergency. During a period of emergency, the closure must be as a direct result of the emergency.

You must keep a record of absences.

You can view the year-to-date absence count for a child via the Provider Entry Point (PEP) or your third-party software.

Families can see their year-to-date absence count in their Centrelink online account via myGov or the Express Plus Centrelink mobile app.

Reporting absences on public holidays 

All service types can report absences on public holidays if the service would have been open otherwise.  

For example: 

• a service that is open on Mondays can report absences for a public holiday on a Monday 
• a service that only operates from Wednesday to Friday cannot report absences for a public holiday on a Monday. 

On a public holiday, you can only report absences for children who would have normally attended care on that day.  

If you do report an absence for a public holiday, you must still collect the gap fee from families.