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July 1, 2026

130 Section 16.4.2 Provider Discounts A discount is any price a licensed provider charges the parent which is lower than their regular rate before any subsidy is applied. Any amount of the child care cost that another program (such as AmeriCorps) pays is also considered a discount. A discount a child care provider applies to the parent’s share after the subsidy is paid is not considered a discount for the purposes of Wisconsin Shares.

Providers often have different rate structures based on the number of hours or days of care. However, CSAW can only accept one (1) weekly full-time and one (1) weekly part- time provider price. A difference between the weekly price in CSAW and the amount the provider charges the parent based on their standard rate structure is not a discount.

Providers must inform parents of discounts. It is the parent’s responsibility to inform the agency worker that the child care provider is offering a discount when requesting an authorization. Providers are required to have a written payment agreement with parents that includes any discounts or scholarships available to parents and any discounts or scholarships the parent receives (see 14.5). Parents must report to the agency worker that the child care provider has offered a discount within 10 calendar days after receiving this information. The discounted price will become effective the month after the discount is reported and entered in CSAW.

Only discounts that are consistently applied to the provider’s regular rate should be entered into CSAW. A discount that is applied intermittently, such as a discount for making a full payment at the beginning of the month, is not considered a discount for the purposes of Wisconsin Shares. This is because the parent may not be able to take advantage of the discount each month.

Example 1: Allison’s child, Kate, attends Kiddie Korner for 35 hours per week. The provider offers a 5% discount on the monthly bill if the parent pays by the 4th of the month. In April, Allison received this discount because she was able to pay her Parent Share by April 4. The 5% discount should not be entered in CSAW because it is unknown whether Allison will be able to receive this discount each month.

The agency worker must enter the discounted price into CSAW. If the parent is not sure of the exact amount, the agency worker must contact the child care provider for the discounted price. If another program (such as AmeriCorps) is paying part of the cost of child care, the agency worker must find out the amount the other program will pay to determine the rate that will be entered in the Override Price field in CSAW.

CSAW generates an error message if the price entered in the Override (Discount) Price field is not lower than the maximum rate. If agency workers see this error message, they should disregard the provider discount and change the Provider Price Type back to Part- Time or Full-Time. The discounted price must be documented in case comments (see