cover matrix

Compare Camp and Childcare Costs for the Holidays — Free

Paste the camp and childcare options with their hours and fees, and read cost per covered hour rather than per week.

The proof surface

Weekly fees hide both the hour count and the gap weeks. Pricing cover per hour is what makes a $210 camp comparable with 45 hours of nursery care.

Inputcamp, club, childminder and family options with hours and fees

Rare devicenormalises holiday cover options to cost per covered hour from the reader's own bookings

Output artifacta matrix ranking options by cost per covered hour with gap weeks noted

Cost$0 · local-first · one free run · samples labelled

Sample, not your facts: Sample: sports camp $210 for 32 hours, nursery club $260 for 45 hours, childminder $6.50 an hour, six weeks needed at 45 hours a week — four concrete points across four types.

Why the flat version breaks

Weekly fee comparison

A $260 club covering 45 hours is cheaper per hour than a $210 camp covering 32, and the second leaves 13 hours a week uncovered.

Gap weeks

Camps run in blocks; the weeks between blocks are the ones that force emergency cover at the highest hourly rate.

Assuming free family cover

Unpaid cover that changes at short notice is not a plan, and counting it as capacity is how the emergency rate gets paid later.

How to work the cover matrix

List the options

Provider, hours and fee per line, including unpaid family rows.

Enter need and weeks

The hours you must cover per week and how many weeks.

Read the column

Cost per covered hour sits in its own column, with unpaid rows marked separately.

Book the gap weeks first

Block the weeks no option covers, then fill the rest with the per-hour winner.

What the matrix replaces

Question	Before	On the matrix
Which option is cheaper	compare weekly fees	cost per covered hour per option
What hours you still need	discover in week three	gap weeks noted at the foot
What to book first	start with the favourite	the per-hour winner for the weeks it covers

Unpaid family cover is shown as a row with no cost so it can be planned around, not counted as free capacity you can rely on.

Run it on the samples, right here

FIRST-LOAD

Data note: Everything runs in this browser tab on the cover matrix: your booking options stays on this device, nothing is uploaded, and the reading is rebuilt only when you press run.

Go deeper: the companion app files the same reading as a scored comparison matrix

The article demo above runs without limits. The companion app keeps a local history, exports the rows as CSV, prints the ready-to-mail packet, and holds your drafts on this device — one free run, then $ 7 one-time for the layer that keeps filing.

The matrix and the per-hour figures are free. The paid layer keeps the whole holiday period and prints the booking sheet.

Open the holiday cover matrix companion

Boundary

This cover matrix works only on the booking options and hours you paste you paste. It does not judge providers, does not book places, and does not give childcare advice. The figures describe what you supplied, not what is true in the world. Confirm anything you plan to act on with your co-parent and the provider's booking office before you rely on it.

What this is built on

Every figure comes from the booking options and hours you paste you paste; nothing is looked up, scraped or asserted as verified.
Method: cost per covered hour = fee ÷ hours covered; the shortfall against the hours you need is printed at the foot
Sample values are labelled samples — illustrative by design, not your data and not a quotation of any organisation's policy.

Before: the reader compared weekly fees. After: they can see a $210 camp covering 32 hours against $260 of childcare covering 45.