Priya had spent nine years building a career as a marketing analyst, turning raw campaign data into recommendations her team relied on. Then her company adopted a generative AI analytics tool that produced the same reports in seconds, and her role was quietly folded into someone else’s job description. She was offered a smaller, less senior position or a redundancy payout, and at thirty-eight she chose the payout and a hard reset. What she landed on surprised her family more than it surprised her — she’d always loved the energy of after-school programs her own kids attended, the mix of structure and freedom, sport and craft and homework help. Outside School Hours Care runs on exactly the kind of judgement, energy, and relationship-building that no automated system can replicate, and it gave Priya a way back into meaningful, secure work.

OSHC — covering before school care, after school care, and vacation care — is a genuinely accessible entry point into the children’s education and care sector, often requiring a smaller footprint than a long day care centre while still being firmly regulated. This guide sets out what you need to get started, what to expect it to cost, and how to build enrolments from your very first term.

What Does It Take to Start an OSHC Service?

OSHC services fall under the same National Quality Framework as long day care, family day care, and kindergartens, overseen nationally by ACECQA and regulated in practice by your state or territory’s regulatory authority. Every person working in your service needs a current Working With Children Check, and your coordinator and a portion of your educators will typically need to hold or be working towards a Certificate III in School Age Care or an equivalent early childhood or school age care qualification, with your service’s nominated supervisor generally expected to hold a higher-level qualification and solid experience in the sector.

Because OSHC caters to school-aged children rather than infants and toddlers, the day-to-day rhythm is different from long day care — you’re managing pick-ups from multiple classrooms, homework time, structured activities, and vacation care programs that run all day during school holidays. The best operators in this space combine strong organisational systems with a genuine ability to engage primary-school-aged children, who need less physical care but more engagement, structure, and relationship-building than younger children.

It also helps to genuinely understand the rhythm of a school calendar, because OSHC demand fluctuates in ways that centre-based long day care doesn’t. Before and after school sessions run at predictable, high-intensity windows each day, while vacation care requires an entirely different, full-day program running for one or two weeks at a time, several times a year. Successful operators plan staffing, activities, and even excursions well in advance of each school holiday period, since vacation care is often where families judge a service most closely — it’s the time when children are with you all day, every day, and a well-run program can turn casual families into loyal long-term enrolments.

Setting Up the Business

Register for an ABN through the Australian Business Register, and set up as a company structure if you’re operating independently, though many OSHC services actually operate in partnership with, or under licence from, a school itself — some schools run OSHC directly, others contract an external approved provider to run it on their site. Either way, you’ll need Provider Approval and Service Approval from your state regulatory authority under the National Quality Framework before you can operate, and if you’re running the service on school grounds you’ll also need a formal agreement with the school or school council covering use of premises, hours of access, and shared facilities.

Public liability insurance is essential, and given the physical activities typical of OSHC programs (sport, excursions, vacation care outings), make sure your policy specifically covers the range of activities you plan to run, including any off-site excursions.

What It Costs to Get Started

OSHC is generally less capital-intensive than long day care because you’re often using existing school halls, classrooms, or purpose-built OSHC spaces rather than fitting out an entire commercial premises from scratch. That said, you’ll still need to budget for program equipment (sports gear, craft supplies, homework resources, technology), storage solutions, your regulatory application, enrolment and billing software, staff training, and insurance. A realistic start-up budget for an independent OSHC service typically ranges from around 20,000 to 80,000 dollars depending on whether you’re supplying a space from scratch or moving into an existing school facility, plus working capital to cover the gap between opening and reaching viable enrolment numbers, particularly if you start mid-year rather than at the beginning of a school year when enrolment cycles naturally peak.

Don’t overlook the ongoing costs either. Staffing is your largest recurring expense, and because OSHC operates around fixed morning and afternoon windows with a spike during vacation care, rostering efficiently without breaching ratios is a genuine skill in itself. Many new operators also underinvest in a proper child management and billing system in the early months, only to find manual attendance and invoicing becomes unmanageable once enrolments pass a few dozen families — budgeting for decent software from day one usually pays for itself quickly in saved administrative time.

Finding Your First Customers

Your most important relationship by far is with the school or schools you serve, so invest heavily in that partnership from day one — attend school events, meet the principal and front office staff, and make sure your service is visible at parent information nights. Set up a Google Business Profile so parents searching “before school care near me” or “vacation care [suburb]” can find you easily. Join local parent Facebook groups, particularly ones specific to the school community, and share genuinely useful updates about vacation care programs and holiday activities. Word of mouth between parents at school pick-up is one of the strongest channels in this industry, so make sure every family’s first experience is smooth, warm, and reliable enough to talk about.

It’s also worth building a simple email newsletter or app-based communication channel from day one, since parents appreciate regular, reliable updates about upcoming vacation care programs, incursions, and special activities. A well-run communication system does double duty — it reassures existing families that their child is well cared for and gives you a ready audience to promote vacation care bookings to well before each school holiday period, which is often when a service’s revenue and reputation are made or lost.

Common Mistakes First-Time Owners Make

  • Underestimating how tightly enrolment cycles are tied to the school term and year calendar, and launching at a time of year when most families have already settled into alternative arrangements.
  • Failing to negotiate a clear, detailed agreement with the host school up front, leading to disputes later over access, storage, or shared responsibilities.
  • Under-resourcing vacation care programs, which require significantly more staff, activities, and planning than a typical after-school session and are often where new operators lose money.
  • Not building enough administrative capacity for the enrolment, subsidy, and attendance record-keeping that OSHC services are required to maintain, which can quickly overwhelm a small team.

Your First 90 Days

In month one, secure your school partnership or facility agreement, lodge your provider and service approval application with your state regulatory authority, and begin recruiting a qualified coordinator and educators well ahead of your intended start date. In month two, finalise your program (activities, homework support structure, vacation care calendar), set up enrolment and billing software, and start promoting to the school community through newsletters, information nights, and your Google Business Profile. In month three, run your official launch aligned with the start of a school term wherever possible, closely monitor staff-to-child ratios and attendance patterns in the first few weeks, and gather feedback from families early so you can refine the program before the first vacation care period.

Treat the first vacation care period as a genuine milestone rather than just another week of operation. It’s usually the first time families see the full breadth of what your service offers, and a well-planned, well-staffed program during that first school holiday break often converts casual after-school families into confident, long-term advocates for your service.

For a sense of how this compares, take a look at our guides to kindergarten or preschool, tutoring centre and driving school.

If a career built on data and dashboards has already been quietly replaced, OSHC offers something an algorithm simply cannot provide — showing up every afternoon for the same kids, learning their names, their moods, and what makes them laugh. It’s demanding, rewarding work, and GrowOnline can help with the market research, website, and marketing systems that get your service known to the families who need it most.