Pilke Lounatuuli – voucher day care centre

The municipality is obliged to organise early childhood education and care as widely and in such forms as the municipality needs. Municipalities and joint municipal authorities may organise early childhood education and care themselves or purchase early childhood education and care services from public or private providers. When procuring early childhood education and care services from other service providers, the municipality or joint municipal authority must ensure that the services procured are of the same standard as that required for the corresponding municipal activity.

The service voucher is one way of providing statutory early childhood education and care services in a municipality. The City of Kemijärvi organises early childhood education services both as its own service and with a service voucher from 1.8.2021.

The city pays the value of the service voucher to the service provider on the basis of an invoice. The customer has to pay the difference between the value of the service voucher and the monthly fee charged by the provider, i.e. the excess. The basis for calculating the co-payment is the same as for early childhood education and care provided by the city itself.

In the service voucher system, the contracting parties are the client (family) and the service provider (Pilke day-care centre). The city is not a party to the contract when the service is agreed.

The applicant must be registered in the city of Kemijärvi or the child must have a temporary change of address in the city of Kemijärvi.

A client may be excluded from the service voucher if it would be unreasonably difficult to provide the service in a service voucher day-care centre. If the provision of early childhood education and care for the customer requires large human resources or extensive changes to the operating environment, the customer will be referred to municipal early childhood education and care.

The voucher process for the customer

You must apply for the Pilke day care centre from the City of Kemijärvi’s eService with a service voucher application, fill in the application on the Pilke website and make a service agreement with the director of the day care centre.

1. A parent or guardian applies for an early childhood education place for their child directly from Pilke. The service provider selects clients according to their own situation.
2. The carer signs a service contract with the service provider (Pilke day-care centres) and the service provider submits the contract to the City’s Head of Early Childhood Education.
3. After signing a service agreement with Pilkke, thecaregiver applies for a service voucher from the City of Kemijärvi electronically via eAsioinnin early childhood education. The City (Head of Early Childhood Education) approves the application for a service voucher and is responsible for the placement of the children.
4. The carer submits an Income Information Form and income information to the Early Childhood Education and Care Office or agrees that the official can retrieve the income information from the income register. If the guardian(s) agree to the highest payment, no income information is required.

• The customer fee for a voucher day care centre is the same as for municipal early childhood education and care.
• The service provider charges the parents for the fees.
• The value of the voucher is determined by the age of the child, the number of hours of care under the contract and the gross income of the persons living in the same household as the child.

Here are the options for the hourly frequency/month according to which the service contract is concluded.

Here is the income threshold table according to which the co-payment is determined from 1.3.2023.

Number of persons in the family	Income limit 1.8.2022 EUR/month	Income limit 1.3.2023 EUR/month	Payment rate
2	2913	3874	10,7 %
3	3758	4998	10,7 %
4	4267	5675	10,7 %
5	4777	6353	10,7 %
6	5284	7028	10,7 %

The income limit for families of more than six will be increased by €262 for each subsequent child from 1 March 2023.

• To check the value of the voucher, the family is asked for new income information once a year. If the income information is not provided within the requested time, the value of the service voucher is determined by the highest co-payment.
• When a client receives a service voucher and moves to a private provider, his or her application for municipal early childhood education and care is no longer necessary. The client family can request, by separate notification, to keep the municipal application for early childhood education and care, in which case the application for early childhood education and care is treated as non-urgent.
• The customer has the right to refuse the service voucher offered to him/her, in which case the municipality must refer him/her to its own services.
• Service voucher decisions are made for a minimum of one month and the payment of the service voucher starts from the day the child actually starts early childhood education and care.
• Theservice voucher expires when the service contract is terminated in writing using the attached form Termination of an early childhood education place in private early childhood education at the latest after the child has started basic education. The period of notice is from the day of termination to the end of the calendar month following the day of termination.
• If early childhood education and care starts or stops in the middle of the calendar month, the value of the customer’s contribution is calculated according to the hours or days of full-day care used.
• The service voucher is issued for each month during which the child is a client of the service provider. During the summer period, Article 4 of the Early Childhood Education and Care Customer Fee Act applies, according to which the customer’s contribution is charged for a maximum of 11 months per year.
• The service provider must ensure that early childhood education and care is available all year round in line with demand. A customer with a valid service voucher decision is not entitled to municipal early childhood education and care.
• The service contract must be signed and submitted to the Head of Early Childhood Education and Care.

The child can start treatment once the family has received a positive decision on the voucher. A voucher decision can also be negative. The voucher is not granted retroactively.

To find out more about the service voucher scheme, you can read the service voucher rulebook below via the link.

Applying to become a service provider:

• Early Childhood Education Service Voucher Rulebook
• Application to become a service provider – early childhood education and care form