To Look After
To Take Care Of, To Hold On To
transitive verb, godan verb
Because the hiragana ends with an う sound, you know this word is a verb. The kanji itself means deposit, and this word is for when someone is depositing something (or someone) with you, because they want you to look after, to take care of, or to hold on to it.
Remember that 預ける is used when you leave something with someone else to take care of temporarily. 預かる, on the other hand, is used when you're the one receiving something to look after. You can remember this because you're great at taking care of cargo (かる). You're always looking after everyone's cargo, but you're happy to hold on to it for them.
Also note that even though 預かる ends with かる and kind of looks intransitive, it's actually an exception! It'll pretty much always have a direct object to specify what you're looking after.
Since this word consists of a kanji with hiragana attached, you can bet that it will use the kun'yomi reading. You learned this before with the pair verb 預ける, but here's a mnemonic to remind you just in case:
You need someone to look after your kids for the day. Hey, I have an idea! Leave them with the monkeys at a zoo (あず)! Monkeys love kids, and kids love monkeys. Now you can zoom off in your cars (か) for the day!
日曜日に妹の子供を預かることになった。
It's been decided I'll take care of my sister's child on Sunday.
銀行の仕事はお金を預かるだけではありません。
The job of a bank isn't only to take care of money.
必要になった時のために預かっておいてほしい。
I want you to hold onto this for me in case I need it.