Everything parents need in one place
One login per family, covering:
Day to day
- Messages from the setting
- Daily updates: nappies, sleep, meals
- Photos and videos
- Observations and milestones
- Absence notifications to the setting
Admin
- Invoices, statements and receipts, via childcare invoicing and payments
- The calendar: term dates, closures and events
- Authorised collectors, with photos
- Forms and care plans to review and sign
The parent app
Tot Tracker's parent app works on iPhone, Android and any desktop or laptop browser. There is no App Store download: parents open a link and they are in.
Parents can turn on push notifications for what matters, like a message about collection or a new invoice, so important updates are seen without anyone chasing.
No personal WhatsApp or phone numbers
Many settings end up running parent communication through staff members' own phones and WhatsApp groups. It works until someone leaves, a photo is forwarded outside the group, or a parent messages a practitioner at ten at night.
With Tot Tracker, direct and group messages go through the app. Staff communicate from the setting's account, not their own number, and photos stay inside Tot Tracker rather than on personal devices.
The school day
Parents see their child's day in the app: nappy changes, sleep, meals and anything noteworthy, plus the photos and observations staff choose to share from daily care and learning records.
A child who skipped their afternoon snack might need feeding on the way home. One who had a long nap might be up later. Small details, but parents value them.
Calendar
Term dates, closures for training days and bank holidays, and special events all sit in the parent app calendar, so there are fewer "are you open on Monday?" phone calls.
Absences
When a child will be off, the parent tells you in the app. They pick the child and the date, say whether it is a full day, a morning or an afternoon, and add a reason and a note if they want to, like "Dentist 3pm". A week away is one form, with a line for each day.
Parents see their upcoming and past absences in one list, and can change or cancel one up to the day itself. Your team sees it straight away, so you can plan staffing around who is actually coming in, and it sits alongside child attendance tracking on the child's record.
Messages and broadcasts
Send a message to one family, a room or the whole service, by email and in-app notification. Broadcast messages personalise automatically with each child's name and details, so every parent gets a message that reads as if it was written for them.
Authorised collectors
Parents add and remove the adults allowed to collect their child, each with a photo. Staff check the person at the door against the list on the child's profile, and the list stays current because parents manage it themselves.
For childcare owners
What changes when parent communication moves into one app:
- Fewer channels: no separate WhatsApp groups, texts, emails and paper notes
- Consistent messages from the setting, not from individual staff phones
- Personalised broadcasts without editing each one by hand
- Less paper: letters, invoices and forms go digital
- Fewer missed updates, with push notifications for what matters
- Parents who can see their child's day, invoices and calendar without asking