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Original poster

Need a good au pair agency

33 replies

wiltslulu · 11/10/2010 19:48

Help!!

I followed advice and have been trying to contact people myself from gumtree but it's just not working out and I'm starting to really worry I won't have someone in time.

Can anyone give me a personal recommendation of a really good agency that will be able to help me. I need to find someone quickly and need a reliable driver and someone that doesn't have complications like not having the money for flights (is it normal for families to pay).

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NewTeacher · 12/10/2010 15:31

abacus aupair agency is very good. as said before the website is not brilliant. £60 is low but then she is not based in London. Having said that I'm in London and pay £70 but do offer other perks.

Debbie is very good extremely helpful and I've had 4 au pairs from her int he last 4 years. Her fees are not ridiculous like some other agenies and she places AP's nationwide.

frakkinstein · 12/10/2010 14:08

The Abacus site is crap indeed! Some of the info is just plain wrong (like the not paying tax/NI). They only don't pay tax/NI if you're paying them under the threshold. If you pay then they do!

HarrietTheSpy · 12/10/2010 13:16

Abacus's website is crap, I agree, but Debbie is great. We've done really well with them. Painless recruitment process and on the cheap end in terms of fees. Almondbury is a very very expensive Au Pair World, not really an agency although it calls istelf that.

Lizcat · 12/10/2010 13:11

I got on very well just au pairs very knowledgable and both my girls from them were excellent. On the first occasion they found me a girl with 3 weeks notice.

Yes all my au pairs paid their own way to the UK I provided them with a list of airports/ports that I was able to collect them from.

frakkinstein · 12/10/2010 13:08

What sites are you using other than gumtree, by the way?

Easyaupair and aupairworld have a lot of rubbish candidates and it's quite fast moving.

The standard is higher on greataupair but you get a lot of Americans who can't come and work.

Gumtree is often used by those who are in the UK whose placements haven't worked out for whatever reason...

frakkinstein · 12/10/2010 13:04

Nope it's not normal for families to pay flights.

Pay me and I'll find you an au pair Grin

I've heard Millenium, Peter Pan, Almondbury, Toto's and aupairka mentioned on here. There are positives and negatives to every agency though.

Original poster
wiltslulu · 12/10/2010 12:17

I've just had a look at the abacus web site but it looks out of date. They recommend £60 a week which seems low compared to other websites and the other information they give doesn't really inspire.

Did you already use other agencies and then found them to be the best?

I'd have thought there should be some sort of kite mark or a quality check of agencies to check they all do what they should be doing properly and information provided is concurrent.

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SnailWhaleTail · 11/10/2010 19:54

Just about to eat, but I found Abacus Au Pairs really good, and no, it's not usual for the host family to pay for the flights.

Hth

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