Look beyond the surface
Workplace daycare: the questions every HR team should ask
A beautiful room is only the beginning. Furniture, colours and activities can be copied in a week. What keeps children safe can’t be seen on a visit, and a workplace daycare sits inside your organisation: your safety systems, your compliance obligations and your reputation. Before you choose, renew or review a childcare provider, ask these questions.
Before you choose a provider
Running a good preschool is not the same as running a childcare centre inside a workplace.
Have you run a childcare centre inside a workplace before?
A preschool and a workplace daycare are not the same operation.
How will the daycare fit with our health & safety, security and facilities teams?
The centre becomes part of your site’s safety and compliance obligations.
Who is accountable to us, and how will we know?
Your organisation carries the legal and reputational risk.
Will the quality outlast the people?
Your employees need the same standard of care for their children every day, whoever is on shift.
Have we seen the evidence, or only the brochure?
Presentation is easy to copy. Practised systems are not.
Which standard does the daycare follow, and who checks it?
Without a clear standard and independent checks, quality depends on goodwill.
Safety and emergencies
Some of the people in your building can’t walk yet.
What happens in an emergency?
The daycare must work within your site’s emergency and compliance arrangements, not alongside them.
When did the daycare last practise an evacuation, with the babies?
A general office fire plan isn’t written for infants and toddlers.
Who checks the risks to children before construction or maintenance starts nearby?
Works, contractors and renovations are part of workplace life.
On a hazardous-air day, who decides whether the children play outside?
Winter smog affects young children first; their lungs are still developing.
Who checks the heaters in the daycare, and when?
Heating season brings risks that don’t exist the rest of the year.
Safeguarding and health
The questions nobody likes to ask, and every employer must.
What happens if child abuse is suspected or alleged?
How it is handled affects children, families, your HR and legal teams, and your reputation.
If something seemed wrong, would every member of staff know who to tell?
Safeguarding can’t rest with one manager.
What happens during a contagious-disease outbreak?
An outbreak in the daycare can quickly become an absence problem across your workforce.
People
Certificates show what someone learned once. Practice shows what they can do today.
Are the staff prepared to act, or only informed?
In a real incident, knowledge without practice isn’t enough.
When were the caregivers last tested on what to do, not just trained?
Skills fade without regular practice.
Who looks after the children when the regular caregivers are on leave?
Holidays and leave are when standards are most likely to slip.
Compliance and value
Having a daycare is the start. Being sure it is good is the decision.
If the law sets no quality bar, who sets ours?
Meeting a requirement and providing good care are not the same thing.
Before choosing the lowest quote, what does it leave out?
The cheapest proposal is rarely the lowest-risk one.
Could our childcare stand up to a buyer or ESG audit?
Responsible workplace practices increasingly form part of corporate scrutiny.
How would we know if our daycare is good, not just open?
Without measurement, problems surface only when something goes wrong.
What does it cost us when a skilled mother leaves?
Reliable childcare is one barrier employers can remove.
Catco Kids · Since 2003
Ask us to show you our system.
Catco Kids has established and managed workplace childcare for leading employers in Pakistan. We helped write the standards. Tell us what you are considering—whether that’s a new centre, a review of an existing one or a quality check—and we’ll show you how we answer these questions.
Talk to our corporate team