Advice on finding a place at a Day Care Centre

1. 

We regularly update the data on vacancies (places available) at the day care centres. However, as many parents visit our web-site, it may well happen that by the time you actually get in touch with the day care centre, the place you are interested in is taken. We are very sorry about that. And please understand that there is little we can do about it. If you want, the day care centre can take your name down and reserve the next available place for your child!
 

2.

If you want us to admit your child to a vacant place you will need a Kita voucher (Kita-Gutschein), which you can apply for at your local Youth Welfare Office (Jugendamt). You can find the relevant details under Bewilligung und Kosten (Approval and Costs). But even before you make your application, you are welcome to look for the day care centre (Kita) that suits you and establish contact with us.
 

3.

Even if the day care centre you want does not have any vacancies today, don't give up, because a place may well come free in the next few weeks. If you are NOT in a desperate hurry, it might be better NOT to look for a place today, but to concentrate on which day care centres out of the 178 centres available best suit you and your child. To look through all day care centres, click [" 178 Kitas zur Auswahl"] on the German page of this site.

1. 

Go to the German pages and click "Weiter zur Suche nach Freien Plätzen heute"
 

2.

First you must tell the system whether you are looking for a place for one child or for several places at the same time for several children. Tick or check the box you want and now click "Weiter".
 

3.

The system will now ask you how old the first child is. Between 0 and 3 ["O bis unter 3 Jahre"], between 3 and starting school age ["3 Jahre bis zur Einschulung"] or school-going age ["Schulkind"].
 
If you are looking for a place specially for a disabled child between 3 and starting school age, please choose „3 Jahre bis zur Einschulung (Kind mit Behinderung)“.

Now the system will ask how many hours a day you want your child to be looked after at the day care centre.
 

4.

If you are looking for places for more than one child, the system will ask you for the above information for each child, one by one.
 

5.

Now you can tell the system which part of Hamburg you are looking for a day care centre in. You probably want one near where you live or possibly where you work. In the search form, you can either select and highlight the city district you want ["Gewünschter Stadtteil zum Anklicken"] or simply enter your postal code / zip code ["Postleitzahl"].
 

6.

The system will now trawl through its database and find the day care centres that both comply with the criteria you entered and have vacancies. First it will give you a Liste (list) of the appropriate day care centres. You can take a look at every day care centre on the list just by clicking its name. Each day care centre entry will give you that day care centre's address and phone number, the names of the managerial staff, information on educational work, photos of the centre and a floor-plan.