When Amy Skelton moved from Tauranga to Rotorua she had no idea the trouble she'd have finding after school care.
She relies on help from her mother, and is considering moving back to Tauranga for the support there.
Skelton's struggle comes as many of the city's after school care programmes are full to the brim, some with long waiting lists.
"I moved over here last year in August and there's absolutely nothing. Everybody was fully booked and on a waiting list and these lists are quite long," Skelton said.
"My children are having to rely on my mum if I've got to finish work late."
Kids Central Rotorua director Lorin Manahi said the centre had been full since the beginning of the year, particularly its holiday and after school programmes.
Amy Skelton and Ryan Hooper, 4, with Heather Carston at rear. Photo/Ben Fraser
"When we first bought the business in 2015, we were at 35 kids, then we increased to 50 and now we're up to 60."
Kids Central had a waiting list of about 10 families, she said.
The holiday programme was also full and would usually be at capacity two weeks before the school holidays began.
Skelton has a 6-year-old daughter at primary school and a 4-year-old son at daycare.
She said sometimes she had to stay later at work at short notice and having her daughter in after school care would take the stress off her shoulders.
While she had found a centre with space in Lynmore, she said it wasn't practical to have to go from the centre there, to her home in Western Heights every day.
Skelton's mother, Heather Carston, soon plans to leave Rotorua and Skelton said she may consider moving back to Tauranga.
"With my mum moving, I won't really have the support here. I've got friends and the kids' father over there in Tauranga," she said.
School's Our Lynmore programme manager Shani Kotze said there had been a lot of growth in 2018.
Kotze said they had 35 to 55 children at the after school care on a daily basis.
"Even the before school programme has grown a lot. We started with six and now we're up to about 25."
She said the centre had a lot of 5-year-olds in after school care. Most of the pupils were from Lynmore Primary but some also came from Mokoia Intermediate.
"We're also pretty popular in the holidays ... we get our programme two months ahead and within a month we have our numbers."
Kotze said the branch did have space for new children as they worked on a ratio of one supervisor to 10 children.
Chanel Whyte from School's Out Ranolf said the centre, which only opened at the start of the year, had lots of space available, but was quickly growing.
"We opened in term one and we've been increasingly popular. When we first started we had two kids after school, now we've got about nine most days," she said.
We can take up to 40 so we've got a long way to go but from starting at two, it's good to see the numbers increasing."
