In ChildFriendly Pro's March 2025 webinar, founder Laura Bancroft said that from April 1, 2025 Alberta centers could not charge parents more than about $326.25 per month full-time or $230 per month part-time for basic child care, would claim the difference as the Affordability Grant, and should reconcile every government payment against what was billed.
What the session covered
Under the April 1, 2025 Affordability Grant agreement as Bancroft described it, Alberta licensed child care programs move to a flat parent fee cap for basic tuition, which she gave as about $326.25 per month for a full-time child and $230 per month for a part-time child. According to Bancroft, the government pays the center an Affordability Grant for the difference between the center's agreed fee, set against regional benchmarks, and the capped parent amount. Bancroft said centers may still charge supplemental fees for optional services, provided families can genuinely choose not to enroll, and that meal programs are the most common example across the province. Because the grant now covers the majority of fee revenue, she stressed that operators need a reliable reconciliation process, since in her experience claim payments are often short or incorrect. She described new reporting duties: an annual supplemental fees report and a detailed Alberta claims record that auditors are expected to request. Bancroft said child care subsidy continues only for out of school care (OSC) children under this model.
What information does the Alberta claims record require for Affordability Grant audits?
Bancroft showed the claims record template taken directly from the Affordability Grant agreement. It lists, for every child, the child's name, a new unique student identifier, birth date, the parent or guardian's name, email address and phone number, the number of hours per month the child is registered to attend, the number of hours actually attended, the capped parent fee, any other fees charged such as late payment fees, and any supplemental fees. Bancroft said audits of these claims are likely, and that auditors will look for exactly this information both when a claim is submitted online and during an audit. The practical problem she described is that the data usually sits in separate reports: birth dates in one, attendance hours in another, registered hours and fees elsewhere. In the demo, a child registered Monday to Friday from 6:30 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. showed 240 registered hours for the month beside actual attended hours, guardian details and every charge, totalled per child.
What are the supplemental fee reporting rules for Alberta child care centers?
Bancroft said optional services can be billed on top of the capped parent fee only if they are truly optional for families. As she described the agreement, centers must file a supplemental fees report with the government at the end of every year, using the government's template, which lists optional services provided and supplemental parent fees. Bancroft said that, as she understood it, a center must also submit the report within 30 days whenever it changes its supplemental fees. She noted that the government's reporting asks whether each supplemental fee is monthly, annual, one-time or other, so centers should record the frequency of every optional fee from the start. For meal programs, Bancroft recommended asking the enrollment question during online registration, for example whether the family wants to join the meals program for a stated monthly price or will pack meals under the center's meal policy. Tracking which children are enrolled also lets the cook plan groceries, alternate menu options and servings per room.
How should centers reconcile Affordability Grant and subsidy payments?
Bancroft described reconciliation as checking each child's payment on the government's claim breakdown against the amount billed to the grant for that child, until the total of matched payments equals the deposit on the claim. She said claims are often shorted or contain incorrect amounts that require follow-up, even though, in her description, the Affordability Grant is based on registered hours and should match. When a child's payment is lower than billed, the center decides who is responsible for the difference. If the government made an error, Bancroft said the center keeps a recovery invoice against the Affordability Grant and later enters the adjustment in the government claims portal. For Alberta subsidy, which she said now applies only to out of school care children, a shortfall caused by the family, such as insufficient attendance, can be assigned to the parent with a memo. Bancroft also advised operators to track dedicated kitchen staff hours separately from child care hours, because she said kitchen time can affect wage top-up eligibility.
Alberta April 2025 funding changes covered in the webinar
| Time | Key point | What centers should do |
|---|---|---|
| 04:58 | Bancroft: from April 1, basic tuition is capped at about $326.25 per month full-time and $230 per month part-time for parents. | Set every basic rate so parents are never billed above the cap. |
| 05:27 | Bancroft: the Affordability Grant pays the gap between the center's agreed benchmark-based fee and the capped parent fee. | Bill the remainder of each rate to the Affordability Grant as a third-party payer. |
| 05:59 | Bancroft: optional services can be charged if genuinely optional; meal programs are the most common. | Make enrollment in any supplemental service a clear family choice. |
| 06:47 | Bancroft said government claim payments are often shorted or incorrect. | Reconcile each child's payment against the claim instead of assuming it matches. |
| 09:46 | Bancroft expects future changes to the parent cap (toward $10 a day) and inflationary rate increases. | Plan rate changes by effective date rather than editing each child manually. |
| 14:04 | Bancroft: government reporting asks whether each supplemental fee is monthly, annual, one-time or other. | Record the frequency of every optional fee. |
| 18:05 | Bancroft: subsidy now applies only to out of school care children. | Keep subsidy sponsors and expiry dates only for OSC enrollments. |
| 23:27 | Bancroft: a supplemental fees report is due annually, and, she believed, within about 30 days of any fee change. | Calendar the annual report and re-file when optional fees change. |
| 24:05 | Bancroft: the Alberta claims record needs child ID, birth date, guardian contacts, registered and attended hours, parent fee, other fees and supplemental fees. | Keep all claims record fields in one report ready for auditors. |
| 48:22 | Bancroft said dedicated kitchen staff hours can affect wage top-up eligibility. | Track kitchen hours separately from child care hours in payroll records. |
How ChildFriendly Pro automates this
The session contrasted assembling claims data from separate birth date, attendance and fee reports with ChildFriendly Pro's billing and reporting tools, which Bancroft demonstrated at 08:48 (capped parent payment with the Affordability Grant billed for the difference), 19:06 (a settlement tab for reconciling grant payments with recovery invoices) and 26:55 (region reports including the Alberta claims record and supplemental fees report, exportable to CSV). ChildFriendly Pro also showed automatic rate rollovers by effective date and age-based graduation rates at 10:26, and a meals tab that counts children enrolled in a meal service at 31:03.
Next steps
- Subsidy split-billing and online payments for Alberta centers
- Alberta child care licensing and funding compliance with ChildFriendly Pro
- ChildFriendly Pro Lunch & Learns and webinars for child care operators
- Book a ChildFriendly Pro demo
