1Step 01
Discovery call
Forty-five minutes. We map your rooms, sessions, fee structure, funding streams and the paperwork you can't drop. You leave with a dated plan.
Support & Onboarding
Switching should bethe easiest thing you do this year.
A named onboarding lead, your data moved for you, and support that replies in under a minute - from a real person who understands ratios, Tusla and payroll week.
- Free onboarding on every plan
- Support included for every user
- Live chat Mon–Fri, 8:00–18:00
AcornCloud SupportOnline now · typical reply 52s
In-appPayroll’s running tonight and two staff have the wrong leave balance. Where do I fix it?
Directory → the staff member → Leave → Adjust balance. Your service has Annual Leave (pro-rata) turned on, so enter hours, not days. Want me to open it for Aoife?
Acorn AI · instant · 24/7
Ciara here - one to watch before tonight’s run: if either of them changed hours mid-year, pro-rata recalculates from that date, so the figure can look wrong when it isn’t. Did that sort it?
Ciara B. · Support, Galway
96% satisfied · 4,180 rated chats
52s median replyOn live chat, from a named person
AI at 3amA person when it matters
52s
median first reply on live chat
96%
satisfaction across rated chats
1.6h
median email resolution time
14 days
average time to go live
Rolling 12 months to June 2026, across Irish services. Support is included on every plan, for every user - educators, managers, finance and parents.
Making the switch
Four steps, about two weeks, and nobody works a weekend.
Coming from another platform, a stack of spreadsheets, or a press full of folders - the work is ours, not yours. You keep running your service while we build it out.
2Step 02
We move your data
Children, guardians, staff, contracts, balances and consents imported by us. You get a checking sheet; we fix whatever looks wrong.
3Step 03
Train your team
One live session per role - room staff, manager, finance - scheduled around your rota and recorded for whoever is off that day.
4Step 04
Go live
A parallel week with both systems running, your first invoice run checked line by line, then thirty days of check-ins with your onboarding lead.
Mid-term, mid-year or mid-invoice cycle - we’ve done all three. Nothing is switched off until your first full billing run has balanced in AcornCloud.
Onboarding
Onboarding is free. This is what free covers.
Every service gets a guided launch at no cost, whatever size it is. Take any part of it below to see what actually happens.
One named person, first call to day thirty
Not a ticket queue, and not a rota of strangers. The person who maps your service on the discovery call is the one who signs it off after you go live.
- Named on the first call, and reachable in chat after it
- Stays with you for thirty days past go-live
- Knows your rooms, your sessions and your funding mix
- No setup fee
- No migration fee
- No minimum term
1-on-1 support
A real person, in 52 seconds. And AI for the 3am questions.
Live chat sits in every AcornCloud screen and in the Parents App. Acorn AI answers instantly from your own setup; a human takes over the second it’s a judgement call.
Live chat with a human
Our support team are early years people - ex-managers, ex-room leaders, finance admins. You won’t be asked to clear your cache.
- Median first reply of 52 seconds, from a named person with a photo
- Any user at your service can chat - educator, manager, finance, parent
- Chat is open Mon–Fri 8:00–18:00, and email is answered inside two hours
- We can see your setup with your permission - no screenshots to send
- Payroll weeks and inspection weeks get priority queues, automatically
Acorn AI - instant answers
Trained on the knowledge base, the Academy and your service’s own configuration. It answers with your fee names and your room names, not generic help text.
- Available 24/7 - including Sunday night, when the rota falls apart
- Shows you the exact screen to open, and can jump you straight there
- Drafts the fiddly things: a fee change, a report filter, an NCS return
- Hands over to a human with the conversation attached - no repeating yourself
- Never invents policy: it cites the article, or it says it doesn't know
Child and family data is never used to train models. EU-hosted, GDPR-compliant, and every AI conversation is logged for your DPO.
Knowledge base
Written for the job you’re doing, not the button you’re pressing.
Over 400 articles with real screenshots, updated the same week a feature ships - and searchable in plain language from inside AcornCloud.
- Search by what you're trying to do - “refund a sibling discount” finds it
- Role paths for educators, managers and finance - no wading through the rest
- Irish specifics covered: Tusla, NCS, ECCE, Revenue, GDPR
- Downloadable policy, letter and audit templates you can adapt and send
- Every article ends with “still stuck?” - one tap into live chat
Knowledge base400+ articles · searched from inside AcornCloud
Plain languagehow do I close off a child’s NCS claim
Ending an NCS claim when a child leavesFinance & Funding · 4 min read · updated 9 Jul 2026
Marking a child as left, and what happens to their recordDirectory · 3 min read · updated 2 Jul 2026
Reconciling a part-month subsidy against feesFinance & Funding · 6 min read · video included
Still not it? Ask Acorn AI about your setup.Ask
Training Academy
Train a new starter in an afternoon, not over a fortnight.
Short role-based video courses inside AcornCloud, with progress you can assign and track - and certificates that sit in the staff file as inspection evidence.
- 3–6 minute videos grouped into courses per role - educator, manager, finance
- Assign a new-starter path and see who has actually finished it
- Certificates saved automatically to the staff record for Tusla evidence
- Monthly live webinars on the seasonal jobs - registration, funding, inspections
- Unlimited seats, free forever, including relief and part-time staff
Training AcademyTiny Acorns Galway · 14 staff enrolled
FreeAcornCloud for Educators6 videos · 24 minCertificate issued
Manager’s Training8 videos · 39 min5 of 8 done
Finance Training11 videos · 52 minNot started
Aistear and Curriculum Planning9 videos · 41 min4 of 9 done
Live: getting ready for a Tusla inspectionThu 6 Aug, 11:00 · recording sent afterSave seat
In-app updates
You’ll hear about a funding deadline from us before you hear it from a parent.
Two feeds live in the corner of AcornCloud: what changed in the product this week, and what changed in the sector this month. No emails to dig out, no version to install.
Product updatesShipped weekly · every plan
In-app6.4Split invoices between two guardiansRequested by 38 services · 14 Jul 2026
6.3Ratio alerts now include staff on breakRooms · 3 Jul 2026
6.2Bulk-sign incident notes from the Parents AppParents App · 24 Jun 2026
- Every release note says what changed for your role, in one line
- Nothing to install, no downtime, no upgrade fee - ever
- Suggest a feature from inside the app and we tell you when it ships
Industry updatesSector changes, translated
IrelandIECore Funding year-end: what to submit, and by whenAction needed by 29 Aug · 2 min read
IETusla inspection focus for autumn: the four areas coming up mostCompliance · 4 min read
IESeptember fee reviews: what other Irish services are chargingBenchmark · updated 11 Jul 2026
- Deadlines land as a dated task, not a newsletter you meant to read
- Written for Ireland, not adapted from somewhere else
- Anything urgent is pinned for managers and owners until it's actioned
Getting help
Four ways in. All of them included.
No support tiers, no per-seat charge, and no premium plan to unlock a real person.
Live chat
Bottom-right of every screen, and in the Parents App.
Mon–Fri 8:00–18:00 · 52s median
Acorn AI
Instant answers drawn from your own configuration.
24/7, including weekends
For anything with attachments or exports.
[email protected] · 1.6h median
Your onboarding lead
A direct line to the person who set you up.
First 30 days, then on request
All systems operational. 99.98% uptime over the last 90 days.Live status page
Everything done in a few clicks. Much easier to use than our old software. Can’t wait to see it develop further over the upcoming years.
Questions about support.
The six that come up before anyone signs anything.
Something else on your mind?Or just start a chat - median first reply is 52 seconds.
Yes. Every user at your service can use live chat, email and the Training Academy - educators, managers, finance and parents - on every plan. We don't sell support tiers, and there's no per-seat charge to unlock a real person.
Nothing. Guided onboarding is free on every plan and at every service size - your data migration, your configuration and a live training session per role are all included. There is no setup fee, no migration fee and no minimum term before you go live.
Yes, and most services do. We run both systems in parallel for a week and check your first full invoice run in AcornCloud line by line before anything is switched off. Mid-term, mid-year and mid-cycle are all normal for us.
Both, in that order of importance. Acorn AI answers instantly and handles the “where is that screen” questions from your own configuration; anything involving judgement, money or a child record goes to a named person on our team, with the whole conversation attached so you never repeat yourself.
Your onboarding lead checks in through the first thirty days, then support carries on exactly as before - same chat, same team, no handover to a different department and no change in response times.
No. Child and family data is never used to train models. Acorn AI reads your configuration to answer your question, everything is EU-hosted and GDPR-compliant, and every AI conversation is logged so your DPO can review it.
Tell us what you’re switching from.
We’ve migrated from most of them. Thirty minutes and you’ll have a dated plan for your service.