“If your mother or grandmother needed to call tech support, who would you want them to speak with?” asks Jenna Thompson, the project coordinator for the Institute’s Child Care Attendance Processing System (CAPS) Online Support team.
That sentiment guides the philosophy behind the team, which provides training and technical assistance to more than 8,000 child care providers in New York City who use the city’s CAPS Online system to log attendance records for children who are eligible for subsidized child care through the Administration for Children’s Services (ACS).
Before ACS launched the CAPS Online system in 2021, child care providers who accept ACS vouchers for payment used a telephone and paper-based attendance reporting system. CAPS Online, which is web-based and available 24/7, was intended to be faster, more accurate — it calculates attendance based on a child’s “time in” and “time out,” rather than total days present, in accordance with state law — and more reliable: Providers can now expect to receive reimbursement in 3-5 days by direct deposit to their bank accounts, rather than 10-12 days by paper check.
But the move also came with a substantial learning curve for providers who had used the previous system for many years. That’s where the CAPS Online team came in.
“Change is hard,” says Thompson, who has been with the CAPS Online team since the beginning and has a background as an early education teacher. “We did a lot of onboarding. The goal was to empower providers to feel comfortable using the system on their own.”
The CAPS Online team provides live online training sessions, on-demand videos, and written manuals in seven different languages. They’re also available by phone, email, and web chat in English and Spanish: In an average month, the four-person team handles about 400 emails and 1,800 calls.
“We pride ourselves on making sure we reply to everybody,” Thompson says.
The CAPS Online team also strives to make calling for technical support — which isn’t always the most pleasant experience — as supportive as possible for providers.
“My team is excellent at patience and building relationships with providers, which is why they’re comfortable calling us,” says Thompson. “We’re kind, patient, and down to earth. It’s not always easy to get a person on the phone nowadays, but people tell us, ‘I call because you answer the phone.’”
That relationship with providers has also helped the team advocate for improvements to the CAPS Online system.
“We have a very strong working relationship with ACS, and because we’re talking on the phone to providers, we’re hearing the issues that arise,” says Thompson. “When CAPS Online first started, for example, there was no copy-paste function and it was very time-consuming for providers. We were able to advocate for them to get that option to just click a radio button. The goal has always been to make the system as user-friendly as possible.”
For providers who accept ACS vouchers, CAPS Online is crucial to receiving payment in a timely fashion.
“Many of us take for granted that we get a paycheck every two weeks, but for child care providers, pay has not always been reliable,” says Thompson. “For some providers, the payment from ACS means the difference between keeping your lights on or not, or being able to pay your staff and keep them employed.”
The CAPS Online Support team’s respect for providers is foundational to their work.
“I was in the early childhood profession for 10 years before I jumped into technical assistance and training, so I’m able to relate to providers,” Thompson says. “People tell us, ‘It’s so helpful that you exist. We know you’re there for us.’”