Getting a nanny for the first time

GeeGee, the nannyjob website is also a good place to go for an idea of the going rate etc!...Sadly you will always find the odd girl who takes the Mickey!

Nanny was live out. I have now let her go, partly so that when I do go back to work I can learn from my mistakes and get a more flexible nanny and get things agreed up front in the contract!

Being a first time nanny employer and not knowing anyone else who hired a nanny, I didn't know what market practice was and let myself be guided by my nanny - big mistake. I wish I'd known about Mumsnet 7 years ago!!!! I also fell into the trap of being so pathetically grateful that she didn't abuse the children I would probably have agreed to anything.

GeeGee your Nanny said at interview it was fine & then said no when you asked her!?!...She's very lucky you didn't let her go & seek a more versatile Nanny!

I don't enjoy travelling with the family as much as I used to as I'm not required as much now my charge is a bit older but I still do one week in the summer.

If I'm on duty overnight I charge my Employer a fixed rate of £35 per night (I'm live-in), for an overnighter on the weekend I charge my normal rate babysitting until midnight then £35 on top.

Geegee, do you mean that you asked her travel with you as part of her normal work and she said no?

I've never asked the nanny to travel with me, but if I did, I would expect her to do it. If she turned around and said "no" I think I'd tell her that if she was unable to report for work then she'd have to take the time unpaid.

I also travel for work very ocassionally (a couple times a year), and my nanny looks after the kids. No way would I pay £14/hour... is that net? We agree a flat rate which covers an overnight stay. It starts when one work day ends and the follwing work day begins. Weekends are different. I pay a set hourly rate for babysitting and I don't pay more for "unsociable hours".

Id your nanny live-out or live-in? If she is live-in than I can't understand a rate increase to sit in her own room/house.

May not be relevant to you, but I wish I'd put something in my contract about travel / holidays with the parents.

I was on maternity leave (with DD2 and DS1) and therefore had lots of extra time off. I really wanted to go away with the children, but found it difficult to cope with them on my own.

I would have liked my nanny to agree to come with me and work her normal hours (or even just a few hours a day.) I would have paid all expenses etc. However she always said no (despite saying it was okay at the interview), because it meant that she had extra paid holidays that she could take as she wished.

She ended up with 15 paid weeks holiday in both years where I was on maternity leave(instead of contractual of 4 weeks.) as well as a significantly shorter day. It would have been nice if I could have had some additional concession for all this extra time off (e.g working a weekend or something.)

Also my job involved some overnight travel when she may be requested to stay overnight (say twice a year.) We never agreed how this would be paid at the contract stage. She would only do it for her overtime rate of £7 per hour before midnight and double time of £14 per hour after midnight until her contractual day started at 8am.

If there are to be any variations to the standard day (e.g. weekends, late nights - be clear in the contract on how they will be paid.

All of my positions have been different.

In one I had all school holidays & was paid for all, working for a school teacher.

In most of my other positions I've had 20days + bank holidays & we've sat down & discussed when the holidays are convenient to be taken.

If I needed a week off to go on holiday with friends for example I'd give at least 2mths notice so my Employer could make other arrangements for childcare.

Sometimes I offer to do a half day on a Saturday or a couple of nights free babysitting for an extra days holiday.

I think it's a bad idea to use all paid annual leave within several months, she'll need holidays around Christmas for example...Very important to discuss holidays at length otherwise you could end up with a very unhappy Nanny.

In my last job i worked for teachers and had all the school holidays off paid. They knew they couldn't quite pay the going rate so the holidays made up for it and the short hours (7 - 4.30) were great. In my contract it just said that all my holidays were in the school holidays and that was fine. Wish i had all that holiday now

you could try dividing the years pay by 12 months and paying them the same rate every month . i did this for a job it was better for me as I got a regular wage . Put a notice in your local school newsletter . They all have one . If you ask I am sure you would find a suitable nanny .

Thanks for that RahRahRachel, it's good to know. My husband has suggested we consider this, but I didn't think we'd find many people who were keen. You're right they're might well be people who want time to travel (for example).

Genidef - I'm sure you would be able to find someone who'd suit term-time only, it just might take a bit longer to find them! I'd definitely consider it, because I like to travel and having 6 weeks off in the summer to go backpacking somewhere would really suit me. I had an interview once with a family where the mum was a teacher, and iirc they were offering to pay a retainer through school holidays.

I actually had the full non-disclosure agreement which i had signed etc in one job.

I could not disclose ANYTHING about my new bosses buisness venture and I still cant! lol.

i would never dream of revealing anything to the press either 9or anyone else)... when my boss did a 'deal' we had the press on the front door step grrrr (in fact we all went away to their oterh hosue for a while )

the sample contract on nannyjob includes a confidentially clause should you want to copy one!

If she didn't like taking holiday only outside of school term, than why accept the job in the first place. Situations chance of course, but if she can't work to the agreed contract any more then she could always leave.

10 weeks paid holiday a year is a BIG plus point in my view for a job - even if those holiday dates are dictated. I would accept a job on that basis.

An "unusual" contract term I would suggest is a confidentiality clause. My first nanny set up a business after she left us which includes a web site. I think if we had not had the confidentiality clause, I would always be worried that pictures of DS1 might have appeared on the website, and I don't want to endorse the venture in anyway.

Holidays - 20 days plus bank hols. She picks 10 and we pick 10.

Then on the home late point, if we are less than 15 minutes late, the overtime from the nanny is unpaid. More than 15 minutes and we pay in blocks of half an hour - so 16 minutes late means nanny gets 30 minutes of overtime. If we ask her to come early, we pay overtime for that in the same way - sometimes it has been a hour early which is not her favourite!

The way I saw it was that I would HAVE to pay for a nursery no matter what. So, it didn't bother me as such, that I was paying for all this time off. However, I did think the nanny would give us a bit of a break and not then complain that she wanted other paid leave during the year as she didn't like taking her holidays at this time. Her deal worked out to something like 10 weeks a year paid holiday, actually a bit more. In a way, I could see her point - she was available to work even though we didn't need her. And it is more expensive to take holidays then. However, I really felt like SOMEONE - and probably a few people out there - would be happy to accept this compromise. Do you think I'm wrong?

Reading that back you said... unusual - so yes it may be unusual to pay for all the holidays if you don't then get the nanny to do some of the days, though you could call it a retainer fee, a way of making sure the nanny is still available to work for you. End of the day it depends on what contract you can agree with the individual nanny.

1a) How common are 'term time' only contracts

I think they are probably quite rare as most nannies I would have thought would want a full-time job. For me it suited at the time, as I thought I would be able to get work for the rest of the time. As it has turned out, finding work for the school holidays is quite hard.

1b) under these circumstances are nannies paid more than they normally would be during the time they are working?

I am not paid more... but if I was to do a similar job again then I would ask for more, as it is hard to find other work to fill the gaps. As NannyL says, some nannies who work term-time, are paid for all holidays.

2. Is it unusual to pay for all school holidays off but agree that all holidays are taken during these times?

No I wouldn't say it would be usual, certainly isn't in my case. As such I am not paid for the holidays at all... but I am paid for 4 weeks (outside of term time) as employment law requires that.
If you are paying full fee for the holidays and not expecting nanny to work, then certainly require that the nannies holiday is only taken during holiday periods.

My employer is probably quite lucky, in that I live close by, I wasn't looking to work 48 weeks per year, and as I was struggling to find work (some parents are funny about having a male nanny), I was prepared to consider their salary proposal.

Thanks for your message. I agree you could be right. My only concern would be what hours she would want to do and how we would manage her school runs with Coco's schedule. But it's a really good thought.

genidif...

you may find a job like that would really suit an older nanny who had school age children.

who may then be happy not to be paid for school holidays, and have them off.

For us for the future, I would be really interested to know from nannynick and the others

1. How common are 'term time' only contracts and under these circumstances are nannies paid more than they normally would be during the time they are working?

2. Is it unusual to pay for all school holidays off but agree that all holidays are taken during these times?

I know of a few nannies who have had ALL the school holidays off paid

(and not allowed holiday during term time)

saying that one nanny used to work the last week of the summer holidays and the last day of the easter hols so that mb (teacher) could go and do some class prep at the school!

I had an opposite job.... paid 8 - 6 everyday, doing just a few hours in term time (unless children were ill), obviously full time in hols + about 8 weeks holiday per year + lots of odd days / mornings / afternoons off. Crucially in my contract i could only chose 2 weeks of my holiday though (but i think in reality i chose nearly 3 weeks)

As a nanny I don't get to choose when my holiday is. The reason for this is that I work Term-Time, so am contacted for being at work during the school term. I then get 4 weeks paid holiday in addition to the term-time days I am contracted to work. So I can't take holiday during the school term. I end up working 36 weeks per year, having 4 weeks paid holiday, leaving 12 weeks unpaid. Would be nice to have those 12 weeks paid as well, but I don't think many parents would agree to paying a nanny for 16 weeks holiday!

I've been a nanny for 12 years and never been able to choose my holidays. It doesn't really bother me to fit around the parents tbh. It can be more expensive to take a holiday though because the parents take theirs in the school holidays. Although i do need some time off in oct half term but i feel confident that my bosses value me enough to accomodate. Personally i wouldn't take a job that didn't include bank holidays as holiday entitlement but when i worked in The States you only get 2 weeks holiday anyway so if it's all spelt out in the contract when you start i don't think its a problem.

Settle down, NannyL. Milarke is right. I then have some holiday time to take off from work to look after the kids when the nanny is sick (and being paid)

I can't see why you think Elusis makes her nanny take sick leave as holiday she says 'the rest my (Eleusis's) holiday goes on covering...her sick leave....'