Terms of Service

These Terms of Service (“Terms”) are a binding agreement between you and KinderSpotter (“KinderSpotter”, “we”, “us”) and govern your use of kinderspotter.ca and the related services, pages and emails we provide (together, the “Service”). By creating an account, claiming a listing, or otherwise using the Service, you agree to these Terms and to our Privacy Policy, which is incorporated by reference. If you do not agree, do not use the Service.

If you use the Service on behalf of a childcare centre, agency or other organisation, you confirm that you are authorised to bind that organisation, and “you” includes it.

KinderSpotter is a discovery and matching service. We publish information about licensed childcare facilities from official provincial sources, let providers report their availability, and help families and providers find each other and keep track of requests, waitlists, offers and tours.

To avoid any doubt, KinderSpotter:

• does not provide childcare and is not a party to any enrolment agreement, contract, fee arrangement or dispute between a family and a provider;
• is not a licensing authority, inspector or regulator. Licence information comes from each province’s or territory’s own published data and may lag behind real-world changes;
• does not guarantee availability, a match, a waitlist position, an offer or enrolment. “Confirmed” means the provider told us they had that space on the date shown, and nothing more;
• does not vet, endorse or recommend any particular provider, and does not assess the suitability, safety or quality of care. Those judgements are yours to make; we encourage every family to visit, ask questions and check licence status with the provincial authority before enrolling;
• does not determine fees, subsidies or CWELCC eligibility. A “CWELCC participating” badge reflects what the government dataset or the provider reported; fees and eligibility must be confirmed with the provider.

Enrolment is always completed directly with the provider, under the provider’s own terms, policies and provincial requirements.

• You must be at least 18 years old and able to enter a binding contract to use the Service. The Service is not directed to children.
• To add a child to a family profile you must be that child’s parent or legal guardian, or have their authority to act.
• You must provide accurate information and keep it up to date. One person per account; do not share credentials. You are responsible for everything that happens under your account, so protect your sign-in and tell us at [email protected] if you suspect unauthorised use.
• Sign-in is provided by a third-party identity service. Your use of it is also subject to that service’s terms.
• We may refuse, suspend or close accounts that breach these Terms, present a safety risk, or appear fraudulent.

When you use the Service as a family, you agree that you will:

• use the Service only to seek childcare for a child in your care, and keep care requests, alerts and applications accurate and current. Close them when you no longer need them so providers are not holding a space for you;
• include in a child’s profile only what a provider reasonably needs to assess a spot. Do not enter information you would not want shared with every provider you later choose to contact;
• respond to offers before their deadline, and attend tours you book or cancel them in good time. Repeated no-shows may lead to restrictions on your account;
• understand that a provider’s own waitlist rules, deposits, enrolment contracts and cancellation terms govern your relationship with that provider, not these Terms;
• treat providers and their staff with courtesy in messages, and not use the Service to harass, threaten or defame anyone.

Find Me a Spot. When you submit a care request, we send an anonymised summary to eligible providers in your radius. A provider’s reply (“I have a spot”, “Join our waitlist”, “Not available”) is an invitation to continue the conversation, not a contract. Your identity and your child’s details are released to a provider only when you accept that provider’s response.

Claiming and managing a listing

• You may claim a listing only for a facility you own, operate or are expressly authorised to represent. We may ask for evidence and may approve, deny or revoke a claim at our discretion. Impersonating a provider is a serious breach and may be reported to the licensing authority.
• Information that comes from the government dataset (legal name, address, licence details) is shown with its source and may be updated by us when the dataset changes. Information you add (display name, description, programs, hours, photos, contact details) is yours to control.
• You must hold, and maintain, every licence, registration and insurance required by your province or territory to provide the care you list, and you must stop listing availability immediately if your licence is suspended, revoked or expires.

Availability must be real

Accurate availability is the entire point of KinderSpotter. You agree to report only space you actually have, for the age groups and schedules you can actually serve, and to update or withdraw it promptly when it changes. We display the date of your last confirmation; after 30 days without a confirmation we stop showing it as confirmed. We may remove availability, badges or an entire listing that we believe is misleading, and may suspend providers who repeatedly report space they do not have.

Responding to families

You are not obliged to accept any family. You do agree to respond to requests, applications and messages in good faith and in a reasonable time; to honour offers you make through the Service for the period you state; and to comply with the Human Rights Code or equivalent legislation of your province when deciding whom to enrol.

Family information you receive

When a family shares information with you (a parent’s name and contact details, a child’s first name and birthdate, care needs, messages), you become independently responsible for that information under applicable privacy law and your province’s child care regulations. You agree to:

• use it only to assess and respond to that family’s request and, if they enrol, to provide care;
• not export, sell, share or add it to marketing lists, and not contact a family for any purpose unrelated to their request;
• protect it with reasonable safeguards and limit access to staff who need it;
• delete it when it is no longer needed for the purpose it was shared, unless your licensing rules require you to keep it.

Staff accounts

You may invite staff to help manage a listing. You are responsible for their actions on the Service and for removing their access when they leave.

Fees

Core provider features are currently free. If we introduce paid plans or features, we will tell you the price and terms before you are charged and you will be able to keep using the free features or close your account. Any fees are in Canadian dollars and exclusive of applicable taxes.

Emails from us

We may email unclaimed listings at a publicly listed business address to invite them to claim their listing. Every such email identifies us, includes our mailing address and an unsubscribe link, and we stop on request, in accordance with Canada’s Anti-Spam Legislation.

These words have specific meanings on the Service. None of them creates a contract for care.

Licensed

The facility appears in the provincial or territorial licensing authority’s published data. We show the data’s own update date. Confirm current status with the authority.

Confirmed availability

The provider told KinderSpotter they had that space on the date shown. It may have been filled since.

Match

A provider met the rule-based criteria of a care request and was notified. It implies nothing about whether they will accept the family.

Waitlisted

The provider has added the family to the provider’s own waitlist, which the provider manages under their own policies.

Offer

The provider has indicated a spot is available to the family and by when they must answer. Accepting an offer on the Service signals intent; enrolment happens under the provider’s own agreement.

Enrolled

The family or provider has marked the placement complete. KinderSpotter is not a party to the enrolment.

You keep ownership of the content you submit (listing descriptions, photos, messages, notes). You grant KinderSpotter a worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free licence to host, store, reproduce, display and transmit that content as needed to run, promote and improve the Service, for example, to show a provider’s listing to families or to deliver a message to its recipient. For public listing content, this includes showing it in search results, on map pages and in notification emails. The licence ends when you delete the content, except for copies kept in backups or that others have already received.

You are responsible for your content. You confirm that you have the right to post it, that photos do not include children without their guardian’s consent, and that it does not infringe anyone’s rights or break any law.

Messaging is for communication about childcare between a family and a provider. We may review messages that are reported to us or flagged by automated safety checks, and remove content or restrict accounts where we find abuse. We do not otherwise monitor private messages.

You agree not to:

• scrape, crawl, harvest or bulk-download listings, availability, contact details or any other data from the Service, by any automated means or otherwise, or resell or republish such data;
• create accounts, requests, claims or availability that are false, duplicate or made for anyone other than yourself or your organisation;
• use the Service to solicit families or providers for unrelated products or services, or to send spam;
• attempt to access another person’s account or data, probe or test our systems’ security, interfere with the Service, or circumvent any rate limit or access control;
• post content that is unlawful, defamatory, discriminatory, harassing, sexually explicit, or that exposes a child to harm;
• misrepresent your affiliation with a facility, a licensing body, a government, or KinderSpotter;
• use the Service in any way that breaches a law of Canada or of your province or territory.

The Service, including its software, design, trademarks, text, and the organisation and presentation of data, is owned by KinderSpotter or its licensors and protected by Canadian and international law. We grant you a limited, revocable, non-transferable licence to use the Service for its intended purpose. All other rights are reserved. “KinderSpotter” and the KinderSpotter logo are our trademarks; do not use them without written permission.

Licensing data about facilities is reproduced from official provincial and territorial open-data sources under their open-government licences (for example, the Open Government Licence – Ontario and the Open Government Licence – British Columbia). Each listing shows its source. Those sources are not affiliated with or responsible for KinderSpotter, and reproduction here does not imply their endorsement.

The Service relies on third-party services (such as our identity provider and map provider) and links to provider websites and external application forms. We do not control these and are not responsible for their content, availability or practices. Your use of them is subject to their own terms and privacy policies.

The Service is provided “as is” and “as available”. To the fullest extent permitted by law, KinderSpotter disclaims all warranties and conditions, express or implied, including merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose, non-infringement and uninterrupted or error-free operation. In particular, we do not warrant the accuracy, completeness or timeliness of licence information, availability, programs, fees, CWELCC status or any other information supplied by governments, providers or families, and we make no representation about the quality or safety of any provider’s care.

To the fullest extent permitted by applicable law, KinderSpotter, its owners, directors, employees and contractors will not be liable for any indirect, incidental, special, consequential or punitive damages, or for any loss of income, opportunity, data or goodwill, arising out of or in connection with the Service or these Terms, including any decision made in reliance on information shown on the Service, any dealing between a family and a provider, or any act or omission of a provider, family or third party.

To the fullest extent permitted by applicable law, our total aggregate liability to you for all claims arising out of or relating to the Service or these Terms is limited to the greater of (a) the amount you paid us, if any, in the 12 months before the event giving rise to the claim, and (b) CAD $100.

If you are a provider or otherwise use the Service in the course of a business, you agree to defend, indemnify and hold harmless KinderSpotter and its owners, directors, employees and contractors from any claim, loss, liability and expense (including reasonable legal fees) arising from your content, your breach of these Terms or of applicable law, your handling of family information, or the care you provide.

• You may close your account at any time from Account settings. What happens to your information is described in the Privacy Policy.
• We may suspend or terminate your access, remove content, or decline to publish a listing if you breach these Terms, if we are required to by law, if a licensing authority raises a concern, or if continuing poses a risk to families, providers or the Service. Where reasonable we will tell you why and give you a chance to respond.
• We may change, suspend or discontinue the Service, or any feature, at any time. If we discontinue the Service entirely we will give reasonable notice and a way to export your information.
• Sections that by their nature should survive (including content licences for content already shared, disclaimers, limitation of liability, indemnity and governing law) survive termination.

We may update these Terms from time to time. The effective date at the top shows when they last changed. For material changes we will give you at least 30 days’ notice by email or by a notice in the Service, and will tell you what changed. If you keep using the Service after the change takes effect, you accept the updated Terms; if you do not agree, close your account before that date.

These Terms and any dispute arising out of them or the Service are governed by the laws of the Province of Ontario and the federal laws of Canada applicable in Ontario, without regard to conflict-of-law rules. You agree that the courts of Ontario have jurisdiction over any such dispute, and you submit to that jurisdiction, except that if you are a consumer, nothing in this section prevents you from bringing a claim in the courts of the province or territory where you live, or deprives you of the protection of mandatory consumer-protection rules there.

Before starting any formal proceeding, please contact us at [email protected]; most issues can be resolved quickly and informally.

• Entire agreement. These Terms and the Privacy Policy are the entire agreement between you and KinderSpotter about the Service and replace any earlier agreement.
• Severability. If any part of these Terms is found unenforceable, the rest remains in effect and the unenforceable part is replaced with a valid provision that comes closest to its intent.
• No waiver. If we do not enforce a provision, that is not a waiver of our right to enforce it later.
• Assignment. You may not transfer these Terms or your account. We may assign these Terms to a successor to our business, as described in the Privacy Policy.
• Notices. We will send notices to the email address on your account. You may send notices to us at the addresses below.
• Language. These Terms are written in English. A French version will be provided on request; in case of inconsistency the version that applies to you is the one required by the law of your province. Les parties confirment avoir demandé que les présentes conditions et tous les documents connexes soient rédigés en anglais.