Babysitting

[teeandcake]

DD(15) has recently completed the British Red Cross babysitting course where she learnt about first aid, safety in the house/fire safety, what to do in different scenarios that you might come across when babysitting etc.

Only problem is we have no one she can babysit for. All of my Dc's are 15+ now as are our friends children, no cousins nearby or anything. So firstly, how can she get some babysitting? She volunteers at brownies so we thought about giving out a leaflet or something to the parents at the end to start off with?

Also she doesn't know how much she should charge. We are in zone 5/6 London if it makes any difference. And should her rate vary per number of children? So maybe £5 an hour for 1 child but £7 for 2. How much do you/would you pay for a teenager to babysit your DC's?

Thanks

[flow4]

I know London is massively more expensive than Yorkshire, where I am, but here the going rate is a tenner a night up to midnight, and £15-£20 after. It depends on her target market I guess, since even in London, many people live on the minimum wage (soon to be £6.50), so I imagine £7/hr or even £5/hr would be way out of reach for many families.

[impty]

Dd1 gets £5 an hour. Often gets an extra £5 tip though. We are in the home counties. She has got her work from a poster on the village notice board and flyers. Now mostly word if mouth.

For some reason she got more work after she turned 16.

Off to google Red Cross course that sounds great.

[titchy]

15 yo dd charges £5 an hour irrespective of number of children or whether they're asleep or not (just outside London). Gets jobs through word of mouth, neighbours etc. A poster at brownies would be a good idea and maybe leaflet nearby roads?

[BackforGood]

Once you get the first one, then word gets round.
My 15 yr old doesn't have a set amount - she is happy with whatever she is given which is usually more than she'd ask for when asked.
Yy to the Brownie idea - my dd did that with the Beaver Colony she is a Young Leader at.
If asked, she says that the minimum wage for U18s is £3.82 and hour, so that would be fine, but I think people generally top that up.

[thedrunkenduck]

I personally wouldn't pay an inexperienced babysitter the same amount I would pay someone with experience- so maybe she needs to ask for a couple of pounds and then as soon as she has some solid references she can ask for a little more. I babysat through uni 4 years ago and I was paid £8 here in London- but I am older (I was 33 at the time) and was doing a child care related course.

Gumtree, childcare and a findababysitter are good places