Question 1

Find a center near you

Accepted Answer

Browse from Home

The Home tab lists centers by distance: Centers Near You, Within 5 Miles, Within 10 Miles and Within 20 Miles. Your saved centers show under Your Favorites. You can also tap a city under Explore by city.

If no centers show, tap Search within 50 miles, or pick a city. If location is off, turn it on in your phone's Settings, or set a home address in Account > Home Address.

Search

Tap Start your search and fill in any of these:

Where? Type a center name, city, zip code or address. Or tap Use my location or My home address, and set the Search radius.
When? Morning (7am to 12pm), Afternoon (12pm to 5pm), Evening (5pm to 8pm) or Full Day (7am to 5pm). Leave it empty for any time.
Who? Pick a child to show only centers that take your child's age group.

Then tap Search. Tap Clear all to start again.

Use the map

Tap the map to see centers as pins. Switch between Map and List, and choose a radius: 1 mi, 5 mi, 10 mi, 25 mi or Any. Move or zoom the map to see other areas.

Filter and sort

Tap the filter button to:

Sort by Distance, Rating or Price
Choose a Time of day
Filter by Child or Age group (Infant, Toddler, Two, Preschool, Pre-K, School Age)
Show only centers rated 4.0 & up

Save your favorites

Tap the heart on a center to save it. Find your saved centers in Account > Favorites. Centers you opened recently show under **Rec

Question 2

Share your referral code and QR code

Accepted Answer

Your center has its own referral code, link and QR code that link new families to you when they join DropIn.

What your code does

When a parent enters your code, or scans your QR code, while they join DropIn:

Your center is added to their favorites.
The family is linked to your center and appears on your Clients list.
The family gets one free full day at your center.

Find your code

Open Clients. On a computer it is in the left sidebar under Operations. On the phone app, tap More in the bottom tab bar, then Clients.
Look at the Your referral code panel at the top of the page.

The panel shows your code, your referral link (it starts with dropin.care/r/) and your QR code.

Share your code

Tap Copy code to copy the code. Put it in emails, texts or your parent handbook.
Tap Copy link to copy the full link. A parent who opens it does not need to type the code.
Tap Download QR to save the QR code as an image. Print it for your front desk or add it to your own materials.

A scan of the QR code is recorded separately from a typed code, so you can see which one a family used. On a client's record, the Source shows Referral code or QR code.

Print a flyer with your code

If your center has the Marketing section, you can download a "1 free full day" flyer. It prints with the same code. See "Use the Marketing tools".

Add the code to your website

If your center has the Marketing section, the **

Question 3

Set your prices

Accepted Answer

You set a drop-in price for each care slot in each room, and DropIn can suggest prices from your regular rate.

Open pricing

Desktop: in the left sidebar, under Business, click Pricing & Schedule, then the Rooms & capacity tab.
Phone app: tap More in the bottom tab bar, then Pricing & Schedule, then Rooms & capacity.

Each age group you serve has its own card. Prices are in the Pricing part of the card. If an age group is off, turn it on first. See "Rooms and age groups".

Start from your regular rate

The fastest way to fill in prices is to enter what your enrolled families pay you.

In Your regular rate, enter the amount.
Choose week or month.
Wait a moment. The rate saves by itself and shows Saved.

DropIn then fills each empty slot price with a suggested drop-in price for Morning, Afternoon and Full Day. These suggested prices are saved right away. Prices you already entered are not changed.

If the suggested full day price looks unusually low or high, you see a warning. Check the rate you entered.

Set your own price

Type any amount in a slot's price box.
Tap Save room.

Each price shows a label:

Suggested means it matches the price we suggest from your regular rate.
Your price means you set it yourself.

If your price is different from the suggestion, you see Use suggested with the suggested amount. Tap it to switch to the suggestion. To use every suggestio

Question 4

Check out a child and handle late pickups

Accepted Answer

When a child goes home, check them out by scanning the parent's QR code or by asking the parent to confirm the pickup in the DropIn app.

Check out with a QR code

The parent shows a check-out QR code on their phone.

Open the scanner (Scan QR Code in the left sidebar on a computer, or the round QR button on the phone app).
Scan the parent's code.
Under Who is picking up?, choose the parent, the emergency contact, or Other person. For Other person, type their name.
Tap Confirm Checkout.

The booking moves to Completed.

Check out without a QR code

Find the child in the Checked In column (or open the booking).
Tap Check Out. The scanner opens.
Tap Manual Check In / Out.
Choose who is picking up.
Tap Request parent confirmation.

If you opened the scanner another way (for example with the round QR button), Manual Check In / Out shows a list of the children booked for today. Tap the child marked Check out, then follow steps 4 and 5.

The parent gets a request in the DropIn app to confirm the pickup. The card shows Waiting for parent until they answer:

If the parent confirms, the booking moves to Completed.
If the parent declines, the request is removed and the child stays checked in. You can try again.
If the parent does not answer, the booking completes on its own after a waiting period.

To withdraw a request (for example, you reached the parent another way), tap Cancel request

Question 5

Set your schedule and open spots

Accepted Answer

Your schedule tells parents which care slots you offer, at what hours, on which days, and how many drop-in spots you have.

Open Pricing & Schedule

Desktop: in the left sidebar, under Business, click Pricing & Schedule.
Phone app: tap More in the bottom tab bar, then Pricing & Schedule.

It has three tabs: Weekly template, Rooms & capacity and Calendar.

Choose your care slots

A slot is a block of care that parents can book, such as Morning, Afternoon or Full Day. These three are on by default. Evening, Saturday and Sunday are also there, but off.

On the Weekly template tab, under Your care slots:

Use the switch on a slot to turn it on or off. A slot that is off is hidden from parents, but keeps its hours and prices.
To add your own slot, tap + Add slot, enter a Name, pick a Color and tap Create slot.
To change a slot's name or color, tap Rename.

Set your weekly hours

Under Weekly hours, each slot that is on has a row, with a column for each day.

To offer a slot on a day, tap + in that day's box, then set the start and end time.
To stop offering a slot on a day, tap ×.
Tap Save hours.

The hours you entered during setup are saved on the Full Day slot.

Close dates and holidays

Open the Calendar tab (or tap Manage calendar).
Tap a date on the calendar. Add a reason if you want (for example, staff training), then tap **

Question 6

See and reply to reviews

Accepted Answer

Parents can review your center after a visit, and you can read each review, reply in public and flag a review for our team to check.

Open your reviews

On a computer, click Reviews in the left sidebar under Operations. On the phone app, tap More in the bottom tab bar, then Reviews.

Every staff member can open Reviews.

What you see

Your average rating, the number of reviews and a breakdown by star rating.
Top strengths and Areas to improve, based on the tags parents choose.
A count of unreplied reviews at the top of the page, if you have any.
The list of reviews. Use Sort to show Most recent, Highest rating or Lowest rating first.

New reviews appear here as soon as a parent posts them.

Reply to a review

Find the review and tap Reply.
Write your reply (up to 2,000 characters).
Tap Post reply.

Your reply is public. Parents who read your reviews later will see it, so be helpful and specific.

Frequently Read Articles

Browse All Categories