Still Pay Nanny??

Sorry mimi (auto corrected to mimic! )

Mimic - taking her on holiday with them is a whole new issue. She may have other commitments in the evenings or at the weekend. Babysitting that she would lose the money from. A paid for evening class. A regular sports club she attends. An elderly parent she helps.

Nanny should get paid and if they want her to work those hours, they should take her on holidays with them and not expect her to do extra when they get back.

Sorry missed a bit - most other jobs employees get to choose most of their holidays (with some days taken out for bank hols a maybe a shutdown over Christmas in some offices) and again, subject to employers approval. In fact I can't think of many jobs where an employee wouldn't get any choice at all.

Cindy - for those of us given 2 weeks leave of our choice it's still subject to be approved by the employer. If I requested a week and my employer said sorry I'm on a course that week then I'd just choose a different week.
I think if an employer wants to limit holiday to school holidays only this is fine as long as it's been discussed upfront at interview stage.

nanny gets paid . It is them who are unavailable

Ah - it's because your standard working week is 6 days not 5 days. Hadn't realised that.

The standard minimum is 5.6 weeks (so if someone works 2 days a week they get 11.2 days of annual leave which is 5.6 weeks worth to them) but there's a ceiling of 28 days on the statutory minimum so someone who works 6 days a week is only entitled to 28 days off which is significantly less leave pro-rata than someone who works 5 days a week and is also entitled to 28 days off. This seems very unfair to me - a good employer would stick to 5.6 weeks and give you 33.6 days but this government website confirms they aren't obliged to.

The other thing that concerns me OP is that you phrased your opening question about this issue in terms of "still being paid" - I hope you are always paid for your annual leave entitlement - you have the right to paid holiday. Additional unpaid holiday over and above your entitlement is a separate thing that can be negotiated with mutual consent.

I agree that you should be paid. But i have always had 2xwks my choice, 2xwk their choice and then if they went over they still paid me. Do you think your boss purposely had the contract set like that, thinking that they could then get away with not paying you when they went away?
I think i would chat with them and either set it so you each choose half the hol, or discuss when you woukd like to take your hols and they can then choose to takw same wks if they want

A lot of nannies these days do not work 5 equal length days Mon-Fri, so the 4 weeks plus bank holidays does not work. Instead holiday gets calculated in hours, or if every day worked is equal length then it can be calculated in days.

The giving x weeks of choice to nanny does not make sense to me. Whilst parents will try to give their nanny time off when the nanny wants it, there will be times when that is not possible. Other jobs don't have 2 weeks employee choice, so why are nannies getting that? Some years parents may be able to fit in with all the holiday a nanny requests, other years they may not, especially once children start school and the family can not go on their own holiday until school hols.

Yes 28 days if fulltime

Legally they don't have to give you bank holidays off but you must have a day off in lieu - but 99% of employers do give the actual bank holiday off

28 days is standard , think 5.6 * 5

Sadly long hours are part of nannying and though I agree with what you are saying about wanting a week off spread out over the year I've never known a nanny to choose all 4 weeks in 23years of nannying

Most families tend to go away in the summer with their two weeks so I chose a week in may and then late sept /oct so have time spread out

How long have you been a nanny and was your last job and contract 15mths ago the same?

By the way OP, if the contract is being changed anyway do point out that the statutory legal minimum for leave is 5.6 weeks not 4 weeks (that's inclusive of any odd days off if they automatically give you bank holidays off)

I agree with everyone that you should be paid.
I was thinking exactly the same as Minipie would you be willing to change to each of you having two weeks choice?This would have to follow on from this years four weeks .Even if you decide to change the contract don't do it before this coming holiday.sorry bit waffley.

OP you are obviously right according to the contract.

However it's also pretty clear the employers didn't think things through properly when agreeing to that contract and are probably regretting it. And you're aware the contract is unusual.

If the family asked to change the contract to 2 weeks nanny choice 2 weeks family choice, would you be happy to agree to that?

For them people that are saying that the nanny could go in and 'sort and do'

Well if I was a nanny with childcare duties only, i would only be going in and doing them...

As well as batch cooking, there's only certain stuff u can batch cook and freeze surely....

The parent said that the nanny is to dictate all holiday.
so if parents decide to go away out of these 4 weeks then it is up to them and should pay the nanny as normal

The contract should say family picks two weeks and nanny picks two weeks...

To late now I know......

You learn something new every day. I am somewhat horrified that up to two years of employment that this is the case.

OP I apologise for making inaccurate statements

I seem to have ended up on a thread in childminders nannies etc despite hiding the topic from my active convos, and have been swiftly reminded why I did so...

As I said, TreadSoftly, unless and until we know how long the OP has been employed by the family, no one can say "certainly" or "obviously" anything.

If she's been there less than two years they can sack her without giving any reason at all if they choose to, as long as they don't sack her for a discriminatory reason or exercising a statutory right, or similar.

I can't see any reason they'd prefer to sack her to avoid paying her, but it's irresponsible to say they "can't" without any basis to indicate that with any certainty.

Nanny definitely gets paid and only complete wankbadgers make the nanny go in to do 'batch cooking' or whatever daft things they think s/he should do. The nanny is available to work, the fact the family are choosing to go away is their problem, not hers. Ridiculous to agree to a contract where the nanny chooses 100% of the holiday allocation though, but they did so they now have to live with the consequences.

Er what flowery - the nanny has a clear contract which states she gets to pick her own dates for paid holidays. Yes they could come up with spurious reasons to sack her, but they certainly can't sack her over this.

"not that they can sack you over this obviously"

No "obviously" about it. The OP hasn't said how long she has worked there so there's no way of knowing that.