Outsourcing CCS Accounts Administration proves an effective strategy to combat workforce shortage challenges

As workforce shortages remain front and centre for early childhood education and care (ECEC) service leaders across Australia more and more organisations are turning to outsourcing as a way to ease new managers into their roles but also release them from the time consuming administrative burden of managing Child Care Subsidy (CCS) accounts. 

Recognising this trend in real time childcare management software provider OWNA stepped up and launched a new CCS Accounts Administration service that was designed to offer the full suite of CCS related administration tasks that a service must fulfill every week.

“Our goal has always been to help services in their day to day running of their centre and free up time for them. With staff shortages exacerbated we saw a way to help that is over and above our best in class software platform,” Phong Trac, COO & Co-Founder said. 

“The complexity of managing CCS accounts can be quite overwhelming. We found when engaging with our user community that many managers were spending more time at their desks or on the phone than they needed to.”

“When you add in difficulties filling rosters, high staff turnover and lots of new starters something just had to give and that’s why our CCS accounts administration service has been so well received.”

More time to step in and fill rosters as required says Tayla from Harmony

Tayla Stavrinoudis, a centre leader at Harmony Early Learning Journey, has been using the CCS accounts administration service since March 2022 and said the freedom it has given her to respond to incomplete rosters on a timely basis has been very beneficial.

“Like many services we are struggling on the staffing front. However, knowing that OWNA has got our accounts admin under control, I have more time to step in and fill rosters as required.”

“This not only helps with managing shortages but also gives me valuable time on the floor to coach and mentor my team in both pedagogy and practice areas.”

The dual benefit of roster filling and being available to coach and mentor team members is a big plus for Tayla and her team, however she also really values having a responsive subject matter expert at her disposal in this key area.

“Having the opportunity to engage one on one with a CCS subject matter expert has been so important for us, because account management can be very confusing at times.” 

Eased my transition back into ECEC after time away says Corina from Saranna ELC

Corina Barrett from Saranna ECEC Centre in Western Australia has recently returned to centre based care after a period working as a TAFE lecturer and also at the Regulatory Authority in Perth and highlighted her transition was made much easier with the help of accounts admin support.  

“Having spent some time away from centre leadership in other roles my transition back into centre leadership has been so much easier with the help of the CCS accounts admin team.”

“Jen, our contact in the CCS accounts admin team, is fabulous. Whenever I have a question I just ask her and she replies super promptly. She is really on the ball. Any discrepancies in our accounts are emailed across to me and I will address them with the support of Jen.”

“I don’t have to worry about accounts, which is good and it means I can go on the floor when needed because my time is not being taken up with accounts related tasks in the office.” 

The broad range of services that CCS accounts administration can help with includes creating family accounts from enrolment forms, submitting a service’s sessions on behalf of the provider and managing invoices and payments for families on behalf of the service. 

“As with any modern enterprise our user community is at the centre of everything that we do. Our CCS accounts administration service is a terrific example of a customer-led initiative that is really helping people during this very challenging period,” Phong said. 

For more information on how OWNA’s CCS Accounts Administration service can help you please click here.