£10 net is about £15 gross for full time hours.

I would guess that for London, you need to base your figures on about £12 - £15 per hour gross

Hi, I have worked in both a nursery and as a nanny. My opinion is that if there is not much difference in figured, nanny is better. The children will get more one on one attention and the nanny can take them out and about as they wish. The nursery I worked for was great but obviously things are more structured and less able to cater for individual children. I dont know what the nursery fees are like but I would imagine they should be less than the cost of a live out nanny. Good luck

Hard to know what going rates are... especially in London. But looking around at nanny job sites - such as www.nannyjob.co.uk will give some suggestion. I would have thought you would be looking around the £10-£13 gross per hour figure being in London. Outside of the M25 that drops to £7-£11 gross per hour.

Looking at Nannyjob there are jobs in
Cheme - £8-£10 net (so add about 25% for the gross figure - as an employer you should always use Gross figures for salary, as that what taxation is calculated from).
Acton - £9-£10 net
SW14 - £450 net per week
Hammersmith - £500 net per week
Richmond - £10 per hour net.

So looks like it could be £12-£13 gross per hour mark in your area for someone with lots of experience.

Thanks nannynick, Lynette and littlestars for all valued feedback. I truly appreciate.
I have just moved (in a hurry as a matter of fact) from other country to the area (Kew) and have very little knowledge of how the childcare system works here. Now that things start to settle down a bit we start to look at other available options (nanny - CM - etc.)

I did consider staying at home but it would damage my career in the longer term and I do want my children to have an exposure in other environments than home. Now it is just a matter of find the most suitable solution to our situation.

The cost of 3500 was roughly calculated based on the first invoice I received from the daycare. I might be wrong to state that they charge 70 per day. It might very well be 75. Need to check that.....

What is the typical going rate for a live-out nanny?

Again, thank you so much for all your advice. It is really an eye-opening for me.

Nurseries around here in W-London are £60-£75 per day and cms £50-£65 per day. So prob in London.

£70 a day per child

thats VERY expensive

thought nurserys were around the £45 mark area depending

you would def be able to find a live in nanny for MUCH less than £3500 a month and probably a live out one either young or with a little bit of experience

But surely if your eldest is already at nursery, you would have figured out the economics before now.

Where (roughly)do you live? And why are you sending your DC's to a nusrsery which isn't great, but costs so much?

When considering childcare, look at what you may need in future as well. Such as when your eldest starts school... how will you cope with that. The nursery may not collect from the school.
Have you considered Childminders? In my area typical childminder fees are £4.50-£5 per hour, per child... so say up to £100 a day for two children. Lower cost than both nursery and nanny options so far, based on my calculations. Though it will depend on local childminder fee rates and what is/isn't included in that fee.

If paying for child care really leaves you with hardly any money..why are you going back ot work? Indeed, can you aford to go back to work?

Not sure how you are getting your £3500 a month, if cost is £70 per day per child.
£140 a day, £700 a week, £36400 a year (based on 52 week year). So about £3033 a month.

So the cost difference between a nanny and the nursery may not be much. BUT there will be other factors to consider... such as with a nanny you don't need to get the children up in the morning, plus a nanny may care for a child who is mildly ill. There are negative points as well, such as if nanny is ill, you need to cover their day(s) off. Nannies have holiday at some point (5.6 weeks holiday statutory entitlement) so you need to cover that between you and DH.