Frequently asked questions

Nanny agencies find you a caregiver and step back. Novinway employs, trains, and supervises every caregiver on an ongoing basis. Each one is our W-2 employee, not a contractor or a referral. Before your caregiver ever meets your child, our clinician develops an individualized Care Profile and trains them on your child's specific needs. We handle scheduling, backup coverage, and ongoing oversight so the quality of care stays consistent. We also offer System Navigation, a separate service that puts a dedicated navigator in your corner for the providers, the deadlines, the benefits, and the system itself. No one else puts both together.

No. Novinway provides respite care and System Navigation, not therapy, not clinical treatment, and not a replacement for the clinical services your child may already receive. We don't diagnose, and we don't bill insurance. Our supervising clinician is a Board-Certified Behavior Analyst who designs every Care Profile, trains every caregiver, and provides ongoing oversight. That expertise is what makes our care genuinely specialized. But what families experience day to day is a skilled, consistent caregiver who knows their child, and a navigator who keeps everything around them running.

We serve neurodivergent children, teens, and young adults. For younger children, care typically focuses on routines, sensory support, and daily living skills. For older children and teenagers, it often looks more like a consistent companion - someone they trust, look forward to seeing, and can do things with in the community. System Navigation is useful at any age, from the early evaluation process all the way through major transitions like aging out of school services.

No. For respite care, if your child has needs that call for a caregiver with specialized training and experience, we can likely help - a formal diagnosis isn't a requirement. For System Navigation, we work with families at any stage, including before a diagnosis is in place. If you're trying to understand what's happening with your child, find the right evaluators, navigate the diagnostic process, or simply figure out where to start, that's exactly the kind of situation a navigator can help with.

Both services launch together across the full region: Maryland (Montgomery, Prince George's, Howard, Anne Arundel, Baltimore County & City, and Frederick), Northern Virginia (Fairfax, Arlington, and Loudoun Counties, plus the Cities of Alexandria and Falls Church), and Washington DC. Respite Care is delivered in your home and out in the community; System Navigation is delivered remotely, wherever you are. Not sure if you're in our service area? Reach out — we're expanding based on where families need us.

Yes — most of the children we serve are autistic, have ADHD, or both. We also work with children who have Down syndrome, sensory processing differences, intellectual disabilities, and other diagnoses, as well as children who don't yet have a diagnosis. A formal diagnosis is never a requirement.

Novinway is private-pay and doesn't bill Medicaid or any government program. Families who have or are pursuing a Medicaid waiver — such as the Maryland Community Pathways Waiver or Virginia's DD waivers — sometimes use Novinway in addition to waiver-funded services. Your System Navigator can help you understand what your waiver covers and where Novinway fits alongside it.

The Care Profile is the individualized document our supervising clinician develops before any caregiver meets your child. It captures everything a caregiver needs to know to do this well: your child's communication style, sensory profile, daily routines, preferences, what calms them, what doesn't, and what has and hasn't worked with previous caregivers. It's the foundation for your caregiver's training, and it's updated as your child grows and their needs change. For returning Flex families, we review and refresh the Care Profile before each new booking period.

For families on the Monthly plan, we build a consistent caregiving relationship as a core part of the service. You're matched with a dedicated caregiver and a recurring schedule is built around your family's routine. We also prepare a trained backup caregiver who knows your child's Care Profile for times when your primary caregiver is unavailable - so coverage doesn't mean starting over with someone new. For Flex families, we make every effort to assign the same caregiver across bookings, but because Flex is on-demand scheduling, we can't offer the same level of consistency as the Monthly plan.

Every caregiver completes two phases of paid training before meeting any child. The first phase covers the Natural Environment Teaching (NET) framework, neuroaffirming care practices, de-escalation techniques, mandated reporter obligations, and incident documentation. The second phase is entirely specific to your child - our supervising clinician trains each caregiver directly using your child's Care Profile, covering their routines, communication style, sensory needs, behavioral patterns, and any existing support strategies that are already working. If your child has support plans or clinical strategies in place from other providers, we incorporate those. Annual refresher training is required for all caregivers, and Care Profiles are updated as children grow and change.

Before any caregiver has unsupervised contact with a child, they complete a full background screening: a multi-jurisdictional criminal history search across county, state, and national databases, sex offender registry checks, and motor vehicle record review, plus three verified references, personally checked. Annual rechecks and continuous monitoring are part of ongoing employment. We're selective in who we hire, and we pay above market — because we want caregivers who are genuinely good at this work and who stay.

We work with children across a wide range of support needs, and we don't turn families away because of their child's behaviors. During the Care Profile process, our clinician takes the time to understand your child's behavioral patterns, what triggers them, and what strategies have helped. That goes directly into your caregiver's training before they ever meet your child. Our supervising clinician is also available for consultation during sessions if something comes up. If a situation ever goes beyond what our nonclinical service can safely support, we'll be honest with you about that and help you find the right clinical resource.

Yes. Caregivers can transport children in their personal vehicles when they meet Novinway's transportation requirements - a documented vehicle inspection, verified personal auto insurance at our required minimum, and a clean motor vehicle record on file. Community outings can also use rideshare, public transit, or walking depending on what makes sense for your child and the outing. All transportation of your child requires written authorization from you.

Siblings are included in care at no extra cost when one caregiver can safely supervise them, which our clinician assesses at intake. When a second caregiver is needed, that caregiver is always a Novinway W-2 employee trained on your children under the same standards — never an outside sitter. On the Monthly plan, the Care Supervision Fee and hourly rate apply per caregiver: $600 a month plus $40 an hour per caregiver.

Enrolled Novinway families can have care provided at third-party venues - religious services, birthday parties, community gatherings, school events, and more - so the whole family can attend together. This is available to all families with a Care Profile on file, on a Flex or Monthly plan. When several Novinway families attend the same event, one specialist can support more than one child, so the per-family rate is lower than one-to-one care. If your family needs dedicated one-on-one care at an event, we can arrange that too. Event care is coordinated in advance - email us at hello@novinway.com and we'll work out the details.

Your System Navigator learns your family's full situation and maintains a living roadmap of every provider, authorization, waitlist, and deadline, updated as things change. They flag where your child's services may have gaps, overlaps, or conflicting goals, and give you the specific questions to raise with your providers. They prepare you for IEP meetings so you walk in informed, and they make curated introductions to other Novinway parents who've been where you are. Every month includes a coaching call and messaging between contacts. You make every decision; your navigator makes sure nothing is missed.

Both tiers start with the same onboarding: a Family Strategy, a comprehensive assessment of your situation that maps resources, surfaces gaps, and produces a prioritized written roadmap with deadlines and next steps. Both include a dedicated navigator, ongoing roadmap maintenance, deadline tracking, and curated introductions to other Novinway parents who've been where you are. The difference is execution. With Guide, your navigator tells you exactly what to do and how - you do it yourself. Concierge is where your navigator does the work instead, but it isn't a fixed package - it's scoped to whatever your family actually needs. That might be a one-time project, like clearing an insurance reimbursement backlog. It might be a small monthly add-on layered onto Guide, like managing transportation logistics. Or it might be full execution every month - your navigator making the calls and preparing the paperwork, ready for you to review and submit. Guide is $350 a month. Concierge is quoted based on the scope we work out together - we provide a written quote before any work begins.

Navigators don't attend IEP meetings, but they prepare you thoroughly for them. Before a meeting, your navigator can help you gather documentation, understand what's likely to be discussed, prepare your questions, and walk through what to expect - so you go in feeling ready and informed. Navigators don't provide legal advice or draft formal IDEA advocacy correspondence. When a situation needs that level of support, your navigator connects you to a vetted special education attorney or advocate in the area.

System Navigation covers the nonclinical burden of raising a neurodivergent child: providers, benefits, transitions, deadlines, and the system itself. It doesn't include legal advice, clinical guidance, or formal advocacy before a school, agency, or insurer - those go to a special education attorney or vetted advocate your navigator connects you to. General household tasks unrelated to your child's needs are also outside scope. When there's a gray area, we'll talk it through.

Yes — your System Navigator can work alongside your caseworker, care coordinator, or existing providers, sharing relevant updates and coordinating rather than duplicating their work. Novinway doesn't replace a caseworker's role or act as your authorized representative with any agency.

Your navigator maintains relationships with vetted IEP advocates, special education attorneys, and specialists across Maryland, Virginia, and DC. When a situation needs that level of support - an IEP dispute, a school placement question, a legal matter - they connect you to the right person. You don't have to find them or figure out who to trust.

No. Each service works completely on its own. Some families use only Respite Care. Some use only System Navigation - including families navigating a new diagnosis who don't need care yet, or families with older children who've moved past that stage. Families combining Monthly care and System Navigation receive 10% off both monthly fees.

There's no set Concierge price because there's no set Concierge package - it's built around what your family actually needs. A one-time project, like clearing an insurance backlog, gets a one-time quote. An ongoing need, like monthly transportation coordination, gets a monthly quote - sometimes just a modest add-on to Guide. Full execution every month gets priced for that scope. Before any work begins, we talk through what's on your plate and provide a written quote describing the scope and the fee. Work doesn't start until you accept it. If your needs change - a new benefits cycle, an additional provider, a school transition - we scope and quote the new piece separately.

The $300 monthly Care Supervision Fee is what makes consistent, specialized care possible. It covers your child's ongoing Care Profile maintenance as they grow, your caregiver's training and supervision, clinician oversight throughout, backup caregiver preparation so coverage never means starting over with someone new, and scheduling support. It also includes a monthly 30-minute call with your supervising clinician. The hourly rate covers your caregiver's time. The Care Supervision Fee covers everything that makes that time genuinely worth it.

The $100 Care Supervision Fee covers our clinician's time developing or refreshing your child's Care Profile before each Flex block, training your assigned caregiver on it specifically, and supervising the care throughout. It's what makes this specialized rather than babysitting, and it's why the fee applies per block rather than per session. Monthly plan families don't pay a per-block fee because Care Profile maintenance and caregiver preparation are covered continuously by their $300 monthly fee.

FSA and dependent care accounts may apply to Novinway services. We can provide documentation of services for families who want to pursue reimbursement through those programs. Eligibility depends on your specific plan and how your benefits administrator classifies the services, so it's worth a conversation with them before assuming one way or the other. We're happy to provide whatever documentation helps support your claim. We don't bill insurance directly.

No long-term contracts. The Monthly care plan and Guide are month-to-month - cancel with 30 days' notice. Concierge is scoped to the need: a one-time project has no ongoing commitment once it's complete, and an ongoing add-on or full-execution arrangement is month-to-month like Guide. For individual Flex sessions: cancel 48 hours or more in advance and there's no additional charge beyond the Care Supervision Fee already applied to that block. Cancellations inside 48 hours are charged the full session - your caregiver is paid their guaranteed shift regardless, because they held that time for your family. Severe weather is always exempt. Bookings made inside 24 hours incur a $50 last-minute fee. If Novinway is ever unable to deliver a booked session, all fees are refunded.

No. Novinway is a private-pay service and doesn't bill insurance or any government program. We provide respite care and System Navigation - nonclinical services that fall outside standard insurance coverage. Families interested in reimbursement through FSA or dependent care accounts should see the question above.

We launch in September 2026. Founding families who reach out now will be brought on first. We don't bring everyone on at once — we take the time to match each family with the right caregiver, build their Care Profile, and make sure everything is in place before care begins. That takes time to do well, and we're not going to rush it.