Au Pair/Live In Nanny - Free accommodation?

[Sprinkles212]

I'd like to canvass some opinions. I am returning full-time to the workplace soon (almost completed a law degree) and I have 3 school age children that are all in full time education now, youngest has just started.

I am a single parent and have no family support local to me.
If you were an au pair or a nanny, would you consider working for a family with a reduced rate of pay but with free accommodation that would include utilities?

Naturally there would be a mutually agreeable contract put in place. The individual in question would be deemed as self employed and so responsible for their own tax etc.

Am I living in cloud cuckoo land or is this actually doable? Has anyone else out there got any experience, from either party?

Someone with more knowledge will be along but when I looked at this a few years ago, that was the expected deal. Roof over their head and reduced pay.

au pairs are pretty much always live in and that's part of the deal., but so is the fact that they can only work about 15 hours / week I think that for HMRC purposes, you can't have a self employed nanny - you will need to organise their pension and pay their tax for them (hence advertise gross salary) but there are excellent companies who do that for you (nanny tax for eg) and it doesn't cost much.

This gives the low down for you as the host family

www.aupairworld.com/en/hosting-an-au-pair

A couple of my colleagues live with families as lodgers, but pay a reduced rate in exchange for a number of hours childcare (but really just being in the house with children old enough to look after themselves). If the price is right I’m sure you’ll get someone. Depends on level of work Though, don’t think you could do this with little kids.

The deal with an au pair is free accommodation and pocket money and sometimes language lessons in exchange for some hours childcare- I don’t think you’re adding anything extra.

Not sure how they would be self employed

Sounds like an au pair set up

That's how au pairs work - you don't charge them rent!

Thank you Putitdownnow, it's not something I have much knowledge of (as you can tell) but I naturally want the security of someone trustworthy in my own home with my children giving me the ability to work what may sometimes be long hours or involve commuting.

Their day would mostly be their own (I guess bar childcare related chores) as my children are all in school from 8.30 - 3.30pm.

If they are only working for you, I don't see how you can get out of being their employer. You can't just decide someone is self employed, they have to fit the criteria for self employment from HMRC.

An au pair and a Nanny are very different eg roles.
An au pair receives pocket money and works a limited number of hours in exchange for living as part of the family.
A nanny might live in or out, received PAYE and holidays and sick pay etc.
Mumsnet is great for advice regarding au pairs there are lots of helpful threads.

You can't say they are self employed just to save you dealing with tax and pensions. A live in nanny is your employee, that's the rules.

Wow, thank you so much everyone for your speedy replies. There's already a wealth of information for me to look at here, thank you.

Are there any tips that seasoned parents could offer that have perhaps accessed such services previously?

We have a 4 bedroom home so the au pair would essentially have her own room with her own separate toilet. We live in a lovely little village but easily commutable to the city by car or bus and we are generally quite an organised household so I imagine there would be very little needed in terms of the children establishing a routine.

Do people include food?

And what's the general rate of pay? We are based in the East Midlands.

Apologies for all of the questions but much appreciation for all of the answers.

I would definitely ensure that I had all the correct terms etc in place upon finding someone so of course if their tax needs were my responsibility then that would be completely fine and taken care of.

Au pair pay is around £100 per week plus a few benefits gym/bus pass or help with language lessons for up to 25 hours per week - you are not going to get childcare for less than that.

Thank you Alwayscheerful, that's really helpful. I will most definitely take a look around

RicStar, that's quite reasonable considering the amounts I have paid in Childcare over these last few year.

Au pairs are not employees and normally paid below the ni threshold so no paye etc. You will need a contract / agreement. I think au pairs are most attracted to large cities / areas with lots to do for young folk - I don't know your area so don't know on local rates / attractiveness.

yes food does have to be included - they're essentially treated as one of the family. But check tha twith your irregular hours, you're going to be able to get enough cover with the max number of hours that an au pair can work - they're not meant to be sole charge childcare, they're meant to be a bit of extra help.

From the nannytax site:

Full Time Live-out Nanny
Average 50 hours per week.
Salary ranges from £500-£600 gross per week.
Duties include caring for children including cooking and cleaning, but nannies should not be expected to do heavy house work.

Full Time Live-in Nanny
Average 50 hours per week + occasional babysitting.
Salary ranges from £400-£500 gross per week.
Duties include caring for children including cooking and cleaning, but nannies should not be expected to do heavy house work.
Food and accommodation must be provided and the nanny must be given privacy when not working.

So you'd pay them slightly less if they live in but would need to provide food etc. Although probably just the usual family food you have in; I'm sure they can't come in demanding you buy them lobster or take-aways every night, or piles of biscuits and sweets.

Nannies - they are employed by you, this is what the law states, and you are required to administer their payroll, tax, NI and pension. If you provide accommodation you are only allowed to deduct a certain amount from their salary for this benefit in kind, you can find guidance on that on the gov.uk website. Having looked into it myself last year if you are paying national minimum wage you cannot deduct more than about £44 per week for accommodation. You will not find a nanny who will work for national minimum wage (I was looking at maybe getting a part time mother's help.) We had a live out nanny when the children were at home, and she was an Ofsted registered childcare provider so we paid her with childcare vouchers. We had to pay her an allowance for insurance and to maintain a valid first aid certificate and her annual Ofsted fee but it reduced our childcare bills considerably. The voucher scheme has closed now so I don't know exactly what your options are wrt the this, I'm sure someone else would know.

We also had an au pair (after the nanny.) She was not an employee, she lived in, and we provided her with accommodation, utilities, mobile phone and airtime, a car and a set amount of petrol, and various other perks that any member of my household could expect to have access to. We gave her £75 per week pocket money and expected her to do 60 hours a month childcare and basic household tasks (eg emptying the dishwasher, a bit of ironing,) for that. Unfortunately, with someone who is not an employee and is a young person from a different culture there can be some mismatches in expectation that can be difficult to get across. Our au pair was not a fan of actual work (but was a big fan of partying, driving into London and disappearing with the car for days on end, and drinking all my red wine when she was around!) Which resulted in a very quick end to our relationship. The transient nature of au pairs is well worth bearing in mind when you take one on - our nanny stayed with us for 7 years but the au pair was here for 4 months and left overnight.

Nannies and au pairs are very different in terms how they are recompensed and what can be expected of them. A nanny will be much more expensive than an au pair, even with accommodation thrown in. However they will be much more capable of looking after your children and household and will have a much more professional approach to them. You might find that a true nanny is a bit more than you need for school age children - our's was most definitely at her best with babies and toddlers.

"I'm sure they can't come in demanding you buy them lobster or take-aways every night, or piles of biscuits and sweets." Meet my ex-au pair! She could only eat wild line caught salmon, free range chicken breast, tender stem broccoli, and cheese. All the cheese. Even the cheeseboard I bought for a dinner party. And your last bit of chocolate you were saving for when you sat down later (having done all the bits the au pair was supposed to have done but had cleared off out instead!) She would not touch standard family meals such as lasagne (too much pasta and tomato) or shepherd's pie (she didn't eat potato or peas.) I know I had a bad one, I had no idea you could find them as bad as her though!

Just be aware that having someone living in your house will increase the household bills - our heating bill was about 40% more last winter because our au pair had her heating up full but left the window open all the time - during the Beast from the East. Even our lovely nanny wanted the heating up a bit during the day when we were out but she was in.

If you want more if a cleaner then you need a nanny/housekeeper. Some nannies are happy to do this job but it has to be agreed up front. Dont employ someone as a nanny then a couple of weeks or months down the line add more housekeeping duties. Set it out at the start.

You absolutely must clarify duties at the start. People are very happy to add duties later as long as pay goes up, or there is some other advantage. The same list of duties at the start is far less likely to be an issue. It's related to the psychological contract, meaning employee perceptions of fairness and the agreed (often unwritten) contract.

Some absolutely fantastic advice here, thank you so much for all of your input.

My biggest priorities are reliability, professionalism, naturally good with children, engaging and well mannered.

I completely appreciate that a lot of au pairs are young and sometimes a little inexperienced and are looking more for the opportunity to travel to a different country and experience the 'culture' rather than forge a career in childcare of any kind.

I am also concerned about the language barrier. We are actually a 2 language household with English as our first language so I have no issue with bringing a 3rd language into the mix. My concern is based more around the whole 'I don't speak good english so I didn't understand what was required and before I get jumped on, I know not all non-national au pairs will be like that but I need someone to come in, get settled and be efficient from the word go. I don't want to 'nanny' my au pair.

Beyond that we are genuinely a lovely home (don't we all say that!) it's just myself and my 3 children and we firmly believe in treating anyone that we interact with respectfully and if they are in our home then they are part of our home and family.

I think for us personally I will look for someone already settled in the UK that wants to take on such a position. I am not sure if that will be harder than finding an au pair from a different country....

And yes I concur, I think a Nanny would perhaps not be right for us. My children are 11, 7 and 5 and don't need that round the clock care that younger children or babies need.

Could you find someone from the 2nd language country? Unless it's Wales, I'm not sure they are classed as an Au Pair if they're from the UK!

I've got a friend who couldn't find an au pair -big house in London, so desirable. She ended up advertising the room on gumtree or somewhere as free rent with some childcare. So she's got a lodger who's not paying rent but helps out with the nursery run and does some babysitting when her and dh want to go out. Works well for them I think.