🎁

Sinterklaas came by to see
what gift for parents there might be.
No chocolate treats or sweets this time,
but a refreshed app — both subtle and sublime.

With improvements layered front and rear,
to make the experience better this year.

Features

In this update, we’ve made it easier to stay informed, manage planning, communicate with the team, and access important documents — all from one place. Here’s what you can now do in the app:

🕒 Timeline (on the Home screen)

• Get a clear, chronological view of important updates related to your child(ren). For now, this timeline highlights message-based events, so you can immediately see what’s new or recently shared.
• The planning card at the top of the Home tab contains at a glance information about the children’s planning for today. Shortcuts for planning requests are available under the 3 dots menu button.

📅 Planning

• See your child’s schedule and upcoming daycare days and times.
• Filter the calendar by child, so you can focus on one child or view everything together.
• Report your child’s absence easily, whether they’re sick, on holiday, or simply not attending that day.
• Report absence for multiple children at once, saving time for families with siblings.
• Request additional childcare, if you need extra hours outside the regular schedule.
• Confirm or request flexible planning, giving you more room to adjust schedules.
• See available hours and budget information directly while making requests, so you always know where you stand before submitting.

📄 Contracts & Placements

• See the status of placement updates, so you always know whether something is pending, approved or processed.
• Submit changes to an existing placement, or cancel the request if plans have changed.
• Fully cancel a placement, when no longer relevant.

💬 Messages

• Browse and read all past and current conversations with the childcare location.
• Start a new message thread when you need to reach out.
• Reply within existing message threads to keep communication consistent and connected.
• Delete individual messages if you want to clean up your inbox.
• Easily spot unread messages with a clear badge indicator.
• Open attachments such as documents and photos, and go directly to the image or document for easier viewing.

🖼️ Media

• Browse photos of your child, grouped in albums or individually.
• Save media to your device, so you can keep memories and share them privately with friends and family.

👤 Parent & Child Profiles

• Review and edit parent and child information, ensuring everything is correct and up to date.
• Update profile photos for easier recognition.
• Find details about your childcare locations directly in the app.

• Access and download:

  • parent-specific documents
  • general documents
  • contracts
  • invoices
  • annual statements
• Everything neatly in one place — no more searching through emails.

👶 Child Profile

• Update your child’s medical information, so caregivers have the right details to keep them safe.
• Register a new child, making onboarding smoother for growing families.

🧑‍🤝‍🧑 Contact Persons

• Add, edit, and remove contacts, such as grandparents, babysitters or emergency contacts.
• Update their profile picture, so staff can immediately see who’s who.

If you have thoughts, suggestions, or encounter something that’s unclear — please let us know via the feedback screen in the app. We’re continuously improving the experience with your help ❤️

🎁

Sinterklaas came by to see
what gift for parents there might be.
No chocolate treats or sweets this time,
but a refreshed app — both subtle and sublime.

With improvements layered front and rear,
to make the experience better this year.

NEw Features

• Saving multiple media items at once
  You can now download up to 20 photos and/or videos at the same time to your device.This works from the All media tab or inside an album via the button in the top-right corner. Once tapped, you can select multiple items. Use the download button at the bottom to start saving, and a progress bar will show how many items have completed.

Fixed bugs

• When requesting irregular care, the remaining available hours are now correctly displayed in the budget overview.
• When requesting extra care, the note you enter is now properly included and sent along with the request.

UI/UX

• The planning tiles on the Home tab have been combined into a single, clear planning card at the top of the screen. This provides an at-a-glance overview of children’s planning for today. The planning shortcuts are still available via the three-dot menu.
• The list of children is now directly visible on the Profile screen, making it easier and faster to view and edit information about the children.
• The app’s color theme has been updated to align with Material Design guidelines, improving contrast and accessibility.

Feedback: If you have suggestions or comments, please share them with us via the feedback screen in the app — we really appreciate it!

A little upgrade with lots of care
We’ve been working on small fixes and subtle improvements to make your experience smoother and more enjoyable. You might spot some small changes in the app’s design — just part of our plan to keep things fresh and easy to use! 

NEW Features

• Send us your feedback — directly from the app!
  You can now easily share your thoughts about the app. A new card appears on the Home tab — tap it to open the Feedback screen. There, you can tell us how you feel about the app and let us know if we may contact you using your login email address.
  Once feedback is sent, the card will disappear (or you can close it manually). Want to share more? The feedback screen is always available via your Profile details.
• Approve contracts directly in the app
  If your childcare organisation doesn't use CM Sign, you can approve contracts directly from the app.
• Contracts are now shown in a more logical order
  Current and upcoming contracts are listed first, so you can quickly find what’s most relevant.
• Vacation budget now visible
  When requesting irregular childcare with a vacation package, your available vacation budget is now clearly shown.
• Swap full days at once
  If your child’s schedule includes multiple time blocks in a day, you can now swap the whole day in one go — no need to swap each block separately.
• Enter your IBAN just once
  You can now add your IBAN to your Profile details — and you only need to do it once.

SOLVED Bugs

• Study day cancellations and validations improved
  You can now cancel a study day request. Also, it’s no longer possible to confirm a study day if registration isn’t allowed in the system — ensuring better consistency.
• Only valid study day requests are shown
  A bug caused incorrect study day requests to appear under the All tab on the Requests page. This is now fixed — only requests actually made by the user will be shown.
• Groups shown when composing a message are now more accurate
  When sending a new message, only groups your child is currently part of (based on the current contract) are shown. Future groups for upcoming contracts are hidden to avoid confusion and ensure messages go to the right group.
• Image preview on the timeline now works correctly
  Previously, opening a photo from the timeline could show the wrong image. This issue is resolved — the correct image now opens, and if the message includes multiple images, the full album opens for easy viewing.
• Album titles now display properly
  Long album names no longer overlap, and when opening the album, the full title is clearly displayed at the top of the screen, along with the creation date.
• All images in large albums are now accessible
  Albums with many images were previously not scrollable to the end. This has now been fixed — you can scroll through and view all photos.

Look & feel

• Friendlier icons in the navigation bar
  The icons at the bottom of the screen have been refreshed — they now look friendlier and more in line with the overall style of the app.
• Avatar updates
  Your profile picture (if available) now appears in the top-right corner of the Home screen. On the Profile page, the orange border has been removed, and the avatar appears larger and cleaner.
• Clearer message dates
  The creation date shown in the Messages list now uses a clearer format, making it easier to see the day and month at a glance.
• Consistent child filter styling
  The filter for selecting a child on the Messages tab now matches the style used throughout the rest of the app, making things feel more familiar and consistent.
• Smarter placeholders for empty screens
  When there’s no content yet, you’ll now see helpful and visually friendly placeholders instead of empty screens — because blank pages are just awkward.
• Improved feedback messages
  Red error messages and green confirmation messages now have better contrast, a refreshed design, and stay on screen a little longer so you can read them fully. They can also be dismissed manually via a close button or with a swipe down gesture.

And last but not least, we’ve also done a lot of behind-the-scenes maintenance to bring the app up to the latest standards. As a result, you may notice small performance improvements, for example, the Home screen now loads a bit faster.

Note: Due to circumstances beyond our control, iOS users may need to log in again. We're truly sorry, if we could have avoided it, we would have.

That's it for this update, brought to you with care and dedication by The SDB Octopus: OuderApp team! 

We look forward to your feedback 💖