AP taking liberties or not??

I was feeling quite confident about becoming an au pair until I read this post, now you've really put me off. You say she's good at the job, is that not enough? I'm quite shocked you think you need to be more assertive, I think it sounds like you need to relax a bit. She probably thought you wouldn't care about her using the phone if it's free. If you trust her to care for your dcs, surely you trust her to tell the time? As for the shops, if she'd taken the car without your permission I could totally understand you being angry, but it doesn't even sound like she's broken the terms of the contract if she just popped into the shops on the way home. If I was her I think I'd be looking for a new family who would treat me less like a slave and more like a member of the family. If this is how you plan to treat your children when they reach 18 then be prepared for plenty of arguments!

i think you are being unreasonable and way OTT about her using the car to go to tesco.

I also think that given her cleaning and childcare are spot on it doesnt matter if she is on the phone when you arnt there.... what ekse should be doing with this time? rehoovering the same bit of floor?

and that why are you worried about her getting a virus on your computer? SURELY you have adequate antivirus software etc? if not than thats your fault not hers.

I agree that when you have dinner parties etc she should make herself out of the way, and that you and your husband deserve time without her and you need to day this to her...

i really think you are being very anal abut the car issue and the phone issue though.... if its free,its free,and surely she is capable enough of monitoring when an hour is up WITHOUT you needing to tell here, afterall it really isnt rocket scieence

That makes a big difference, the rural aspect. I can well understand why you throw a car in and how the miles get clocked up. Hard to keep someone otherwise, I suspect?? A different scenario to the OP though who sounds more like the situation we're in regarding location. I do wonder whether I'll find someone (nanny or au pair) happy about walking 20 min each way to school... which I do every day and the other mums think is some huge athletic feat. I on the other hand tease them about being more attached to their cars than even the Yanks (I happen to be one).

Oh and we are rural - a trip to Tesco's is also a 12 mile round trip as it's in the same town as the gym and that's the nearest one.

HarrietTheSpy - we do state in the contract that AP must ask if she wants to take the car on a journey longer than 20 miles - the last one managed to do several journeys of just under 20 miles, plus daily trips to the gym (12 mile round trip)a week. None of the other APs have ever used the car this way, so we didn't envisage this problem. Now it's occurred, we'll be inserting another clause in the contract about maximum weekly mileage. I'm glad I don't sound like a cheapskate! It's my ebay moniker & I wasn't creative enough to come up with another.

Am sooooo pleased am not am AP!!! I'll stick with being a CM, being my own boss and living by my own rules. I think the comments that have been given are fair - you shouldn't ask for advice unless you are prepared to take it all, positive or negative

You don't sound like much of a cheapskate to me, buying a car for the APs to use! 100+ miles a week?! F*ng hell. Can you imagine - don't worry I'llb e out of your hair this weeekend, I'm off to Fort William.

Do tread carefully, NT. Our AP position does have use of car, which we bought for APs to use. Our latest AP started driving in excess of 100 miles a week, which, if continued, would have put it at a higher insurance rate after adding the miles she needed to do with DSs in car(when insuring it, I said mileage would be under 10,000 miles/year). We tactfully pointed this out to her, plus wear & tear on tyres and how much she owed us for petrol etc and suggested she choose to use the car either to go to the gym every day, or to visit friends 20 miles away (there are buses & trains here, but not as frquent service as yours). Next thing we knew she was breaking the terms of her contract, giving us 10 days notice, going home for Christmas & not coming back. Fortunately, her replacement, scheduled to start in Feb, could come earlier...

come on ladies and gentlemen, we also come on here to have a bit of a laugh, well i do anyway, and hopefully generate some intresting discussion.
I have however read some really really sad and needy postings, which i wouldnt dream of treating lightly.(troubles with aps are not in that catagory)
we all have our different beliefs and ways, and parenting can be very hard at times so we may disagree strongly but i hope not to insult, or be personal, then it is offensive and unnecessary.

NewTeacher, you're going to get digs - I am currently having some on one of my threads from one individual, and just had a little rant back actually, 'cos it's a free country. I don't think it's harmful really, you just have to sift through the posts and take out of them what will work for you.

To others - I think OP has only just realised she has to discuss expectations, it has taken a bit of time for her to work out why it all bothers her. Car thing is pure fear of the expense involved in case of an unnecessary accident, I reckon.

"I came on here for advice not for people to have a dig"

you asked for opinions and we gave them

yes it is up to you what rules you enforce, so if you are not happy, and you wont compromise over things, then you need to find a new ap who will do as you say

i still dont understand the reasoning for you not allowing her to use the car for personal use

But your thread title is 'Au pair taking liberties or not?' - to which some of us have answered 'Not'.
If you want advice try 'How do I discuss expectations of AP behaviour?' or something.

(I still don't understand why she needs to use a house phone when she can skype phone).

Hope your talk goes well.

I have to say I don't agree with the other posters having a bit of a go at you for being a control freak, newteacher, because I think you are being very straightforward about what you'd like to happen in your own house. I am also half German, so I have an idea what is going on there in the background on Planet AP. However I do think you could be more assertive. Issues as I see them:

1. I know for a fact most APs are horrified when they realise how much an insurance excess for a young person is, how much petrol and parking is, and so on, and a big factor in car abuse is based on not having a proper sense of perspective on the relevance of these very large costs to everyday family life. All these costs are much cheaper in Germany. Therefore it would be worth explaining exactly why you hate her doing this, and how nervous it is making you feel. You can then set the boundaries again. You should stress that different families have different rules for things like this, and these are yours, because you are British.

1. If she is sitting on the sofa between you, she is thinking you have replaced her parents. You have to tell her that after 9pm this is 'your' time and you don't expect her to join you unless specially invited. This is because you need some time at home alone as a couple. I have found this works well in encouraging them to melt away a bit. We have not had to snog in order to achieve this (although once we did manage to get some noisy and slightly inconsiderate teenagers to leave a German hotel spa by gleefully stripping naked in front of them and leaping into the jacuzzi where they were heading, but that's quite another story).

1. If she is nicking your dinner party food, she is not sure where the boundaries are, and she is probably once again behaving in a way that would be normal at her home. Correct protocol here is to inform her in advance you are entertaining and would like a bit or privacy, and make her up a tray with her own portion of nice dinner party food as a bit of a treat. APs are usually fine about this if it has been explained, and will bugger off and even occasionally help with the washing up later on out of niceness.

1. Phone bills are a notorious AP blackspot and again they are much cheaper over there - you can ring the UK for 2 cents an hour with the right deal. You need to tell her where to buy a special rate phone card and get her to keep a timesheet of what she is doing when during the day to make sure there is a relationship between the hours she is paid for and the hours she is actually working. I have done this once or twice with APs who have skived off their hours and it was very instructive for both sides. Once I was in the wrong so paid overtime and AP was very pleased.

Also I think a nice day out for all of you would probably help reset the irritation clock here. It's hard having people live in your house and it's good to build on the positive now and then to mitigate the stressful stuff.

lol

Not sure what you're getting so worked up about,you DID ask for opinions,IMO you sound very strict and annoyed at your lack of control over AP,and in a way,not too bothered about her happiness outside of her working hours.

Btw,didn't you have an au pair that used to eat too much

but the car could be written off going to school

i dont see the diff bewteen school and tesco/college - she could have an accident or someone could bump into her on school runs

yes we can agree to disagree but you asked for help/opinions and we are giving them to you

you do sound a little mad NT but i know that with me its always the little things that get to me and i obsess over.

I'd personally pick my battles as your concerns are pretty small in the scheme of things.

Good luck!

NewTeacher - my AP does have access to my computer whenever she wants but my files are backed up and there is virus software installed! I wouldn't dream of not letting her use it in case she gets a virus!

Can't you have itemised bills and agree that if she goes over an hour she pays the extra?
My AP has a mobile with a very cheap package for calling abroad - I said she was welcome to use our phone but she prefers it that way.

Re the car, I think if I was your AP I would feel very miffed about not being allowed to use the car if no-one else was using it at the time.

i see both views but if you trust ap to drive your child to school/party - then they should be allowed to drive/use the car (if you dont want it) - if if is the petrol issue, then say to her maybe she could put money in or dock £5 from her wages

they can be in an accident going to school/get parking tickets etc

phone, again if you trust with your child, you should be able to trust her to be on phone for an hour - if need be buy a timer

maybe she is lonely, and you need to say that you need some time with dh/if friends are about

maybe say, we are having friends over this weekend, did you want to go out/get a dvd to watch in your room etc

it must be hard having someone live in your house and be there all the time BUT ap's come and live as part of your family - weould you boot your teenage child out if you have friends?

think you need to have a 3mth chat/how are you settling in/sort things out

I'm happy to be in a minority of two on this occasion regarding the car given the price of petrol these days. As I said, feel free to call me a cheapskate - it would be different if they lived in a rural area or if the OP billed a car for personal use as part of the deal, and then changed her mind, but she didn't.

I tend to agree with the other posters on the skype issue though. Just let her get on with it.

All of this blurred family-employee stuff makes me want to run for the hills.

Um, you want to treat her like a child by having control of her (free) phonecall arrangements and by stopping her having the real grown up freedom that a car gives....except when it suits you to want her to grow up and get out of your hair and not cramp your style?

Sorry, but you and HTS are in a minority of two here. I would never tell an AP that I trust her to drive my children around, but not to use the car for her own errands (and I have had a car written off, one driven into a field, and numerous other things happen over the years). I would also not restrict skype the way you do (sounds a bit like "no, you can't go out to play until you've done ALL your homework" to me).

Dinner parties etc is easy. You just tell her that on Mondays and Tuesdays you will leave her the run of the TV room/dining room/kitchen so that she can have friends over without you getting in her hair, on Fridays and Saturdays you need the run of the house to yourself to entertain in private, and that other days are 'family' days for all of you.

If she is reliable, great with the kids, cheerful, and doesn't smell, you are doing really well. All the rest is a nice-to-have.

YOu say she is fantastic, if you want to keep her then I think maybe you have to relax a bit. Like Millarkie my AP has use of car in her own time on the understanding that she pays for the costs when she is on her own journeys.

THe phone - if she is not going over the hour and she is getting the chores done what is the issue, yes she bents the rules but these relationships have to have some give and take to survive. I had the reverse problem my AP managed to run up a large bill whilst sticking to the rules (oops me) so we sat down and talked about it and worked out new rules that we both felt were fair.

The final point is probably the one that is most annoying, but you can't just throw her out of the punge (though I think Millarkie's idea has some merit), without helping her find somethihng else to do (she is probaly lonely). Mine has found a load of APs locally via facebook and meets up with them two three time a week.

If she has skype why do you care if her phone calls are longer than an hour?

Parking tickets I would expect AP to pay for (since they should not be parking illegally), but I still think it's over the top to limit the car use in case someone else bumps into her.

You could always start smooching with dh on the sofa and embarrass her into leaving the room