The closure of a number of childcare facilities over issues with registration will be "detrimental" to families, the Federation of Early Childhood Providers has said.
Seventeen crèches had issues with registration mainly due to garda vetting and Tusla has said these facilities cannot continue to operate without renewing their registration.
The child and family agency said it is working with the affected childcare providers.
Speaking on RTÉ's Morning Ireland, Chairperson of the Federation of Early Childhood Providers Elaine Dunne said the garda vetting process seems to be the main problem, but there are fire and safety issues with some providers also.
She said her members know how long the process takes and they began it in good time.
One member told her they started the process last April and only received a letter from the Garda Vetting Bureau on 22 December.
"So somewhere along the lines things are getting lost or something is happening that we don't know about and I think what we need to look at is how we can fix this so that it never happens again," she said.
"This morning these services are not allowed to open - and it's not because they haven't done work over the weekend, we've all worked trying to get this resolved. It's going to impact the workforce this morning, it's going to be detrimental to some of these parents who may not have backup this morning and can't go to work."
Ms Dunne said that while she understands there are always teething problems with new systems, they do not know exactly what the issues are because they have not met with Tusla yet, despite requesting a meeting.
"We're always here to help. We've got WhatsApp groups across the country, we have committees in every single county. Had we known that it had got to this level for those 17, we would have gone out to our members and said 'are any of you in trouble, how can we support you to get the paperwork in'," she said.
"And we would have got that paperwork done as quickly as we possibly could."
Ms Dunne said she does not think the number of providers unable to open today is still 17, but said she did not have the exact number.
She said she is hopeful that something can be done in the interim and some providers will be able to reopen.
