Fair questions, answered honestly

1. Who is building it?

   Tea Tin Ltd, registered in England and Wales. It is built by a husband and wife, both educators, whose three boys have all been through childminder settings. Our children’s childminder has worked with us on it from the start, telling us what helps and what does not.

2. Is it approved by Ofsted?

   No, and nothing is — Ofsted does not approve software. Tea Tin reads what they publish; they have not asked for it. And it helps you keep your records rather than taking over the responsibility for them: you are still the one answerable to Ofsted, so please keep reading what they publish as well, not only what we say about it.

3. What is the free year in return for?

   Your feedback. The first 50 childminders to join get a year’s subscription free, and we will ask you now and then what is working, what is not, and what you wish it did. You know what would help your business far better than we do.

4. How do I know if I am one of the 50?

   It goes by the order you joined the waiting list, not the order people make accounts — so your place is yours from the moment you join and you do not lose it by setting up later. We will tell you. Joining twice does not help — the first time is the one that counts. Anyone is welcome on the list, but if you are not a childminder in England you do not take up one of the 50 places. Places close the day Tea Tin opens.

5. What if fewer than 50 people have joined when you open?

   Then fewer than fifty free years are given out, and the rest are not handed round afterwards. The offer is for people who took a chance on Tea Tin before it existed, so it closes when it stops being a chance. If one of the fifty never takes her place up, it simply goes unclaimed. After we open, everybody gets the same first month free.

6. When does the free year start, and what happens at the end of it?

   It starts the day Tea Tin opens properly, not the day you join the list — so the waiting never eats into it, and if you help test it beforehand that time is free too and does not count. All fifty years begin and end together. We will tell you before the twelve months are up, and then you decide. You are never charged automatically. If you would rather not carry on, you can still download everything you have put in. It is one free year per childminder, and it cannot be passed on to someone else.

7. What if a payment does not go through?

   Usually it is an expired card. Everything keeps working for 14 days while you sort it, and we tell you by email and in the app, with the dates. After that the app winds down, but the register, allergies, emergency contacts, recording an accident and giving medicine keep working. If it is still unpaid it closes on day 46, and your download stays free throughout. Nothing is owed after it closes.

8. Can I take my records with me?

   Yes, whenever you like. One download holds everything you have put in, in ordinary files that open without Tea Tin. It is never behind the paywall, not even for a day.

9. What happens to the children’s records?

   Each childminder’s records sit in a separate database rather than all mixed together, so another setting’s children can never appear in yours. That is built, not promised.

10. Is it only for England?

    For now. Scotland and Wales have different regulators and frameworks, and doing England properly beats doing three nations thinly.

11. What does it cost?

    £10 a month, or £100 a year, which is ten months’ price for twelve. There is no VAT to add. One plan with everything in it, so there is no version of Tea Tin you are missing out on and nothing to upgrade to. You can cancel whenever you like.

12. Do I pay while I am still waiting to be registered?

    No. Nothing is charged while you are working towards registration, however long that takes. Your free month starts the day you put your URN in, so the month you get free is a month you can actually use the app for real children.

13. Can my assistant, or the childminder I work with, use it?

    Not with their own sign-in. Today it is one login for each setting, and the only way two people use the same account is by sharing the email address and the password — which we would rather you did not do, because then neither of you can be told apart in the records.
    Assistants and co-childminders are in the app as people: their DBS, their paediatric first aid, their written reference, whether they are ever left alone with the children, and what that adds to your ratios. What they do not have is a way in of their own. If that is what you need, say so when you join the list — it is the sort of thing the first fifty get asked about.

14. What do the parents see?

    Three things, and you choose the third.
    They fill their child’s registration in on their own phone, from a link, with no account to make and no password. They sign for accidents and for medicine at the door when they collect. And if you turn it on, they get a sign-in of their own where they can see the day their child has had.
    That diary lives in their sign-in and nowhere else. Tea Tin does not send the day out by WhatsApp or by email, so nothing about a child leaves the app because a phone was handed to somebody.

15. Where are my records kept, and who can see them?

    On a server in London, on a disk that is encrypted. Each childminder’s records sit in a database of their own, so another setting’s children can never appear in yours.
    In data protection terms the records are yours: you are the controller and Tea Tin Ltd is the processor, which means we only do what you ask us to with them. Harry Holder, the director, answers questions about data himself at hello@teatinapp.com. The app will have its own privacy notice before it opens; the notice on this site today covers the waiting list only, which is the only thing we hold so far.

16. How do I sign in? Is there a second step?

    Your email address and a password. There is no second step of our own yet, and we would rather tell you that than imply otherwise: it is being built, and Tea Tin cannot open to the public until it exists. That is not a note on a list — the code refuses to open sign-up while it is missing.
    There is also a screen lock, which is a different thing. One tap hides the screen, and your PIN or your face brings it back. It is for handing your phone to a four year old, or a parent standing beside you at the door, and it can never let anybody in from cold — that is always the password.

17. Does it work on my phone? Is there an app to download?

    It is a website, so it works on your phone, your tablet and your computer, and there is nothing to find in an app store. Add it to your home screen and it opens like an app, with no address bar. The same records are there whichever one you pick up.

18. What does Tea Tin not do?

    Worth knowing before you spend an evening on it.
    There is no second sign-in for an assistant. Three of the things an Ofsted inspector may ask for are not in it — a list of children you have refused a place, a log of discrimination or racist incidents, and children open to social care with a multi-agency plan — and the app says so on the inspection screen instead of leaving you to find out with an inspector in the room. The daily diary goes to parents in their own sign-in and is not sent out any other way. And it is England only.
    If the thing you need is on that list, joining the waiting list and telling us is the fastest way to change it.

19. Do I have to use Tea Tin to use the pages on this site?

    No, and you never will. The list of policies, the ratio checker, the inspection checklist and the guidance updates are free, need no account, and are not going behind a sign-in later. They are the part of what we know that is no use to us kept quiet.

Checked against the app itself on 1 November 2026. Something not answered here? hello@teatinapp.com reaches Harry, and he answers it himself.

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