Experience with after school nanny?

[Lench]

Single parent and my workplace is moving from 50% attendance locally to 100% in office attendance about 1.5 hours away.

DD is in year 6, we live a bus journey away from primary school. The bus comes every hour and is pretty unreliable, so she can’t walk home or rely on the bus service.

The school wrap around care closes at 6pm and can’t guarantee I’ll be back by then, in fact it’s quite unlikely.

I’m thinking I’ll need to get an after school nanny from 4:30pm - 6:30/7pm. And I wondered if anyone had any experience of this? (Although I can’t think of who these hours would suit…)

There’s no point in submitting a flex working request (never going to be approved) or asking family to help out (no one lives close enough by).

Any suggestions of how to find someone or any experience in this would be very gratefully received!

@MyKindHiker I didn’t mean I piggybacked onto the council taxi contract. I merely found out which company it was, phoned that taxi firm and asked for a short term account as a private individual for an unaccompanied child (so I driver with checks etc). I paid weekly.

Have you offered to pay a school mum to just pick her up along with her own child / children? It's only a couple months of this so feels like you can cobble something together. If she has any good friends in the class with her you could start there - I'd have no problem doing this a couple times a week for a friend (on the days we aren't rushing out to a club or similar)

Could you use some annual leave to leave early for a couple days a week and then put something together for the other days?

I know it wouldn't be looked at very well at my workplace, but if there's a parental leave option (unpaid) maybe you can put something together for a few weeks.

Thanks for all of the suggestions.

School mums just aren’t a possible option. Nor is using annual leave, (that’s already firmly spoken for covering the actual school holidays).

I’ve put some adverts out and am
getting some (very limited) interest. Will see whether any of this materialises!

My cleaner used to pick up my dc when I was working, take them home, clean and start dinner. Later we had a university student who also did overnights, just advertise widely, someone will need the money, perhaps a mum on mat leave even

@PurpleThistle7 is this really something people would do? Would you do it? I see it suggested here all the time and I'm sceptical, it's not something I would consider as a school mum (I have enough to worry about) and all the mums I know are either working long hours too, juggling siblings/other family or ferrying their kids to activities after school.

For just 8 weeks on days my son is coming home after school anyway? I’d absolutely do it for a friend of his. I wouldn’t quit my job or skip football for it but it wouldn’t be a problem on the days it worked. At this particular moment we have my son’s friend here as his mum had to take their cat to the vet - she phoned on their way and dropped him here.

You have to be prepared to do it when it’s your turn of course.

Not sure if it’s an option but I found an after school nanny who is also a teaching assistant. She collects my daughter from after school club and stays with her until I get home around 7. It does mean 2 lots of after school care but it’s the only thing that works for me.

You have three months as you won’t need a nanny after primary school unless there are any additional needs. Can you take any annual leave and parental leave to last until the end of term?

Given that the job clearly can be done remotely, is this not indirect discrimination against women? Because they are much more likely to have caring responsibilities and have arranged their work around that?

I am sure a healthcare professional won a similar ish claim against her employer on that basis.

https://www.farrer.co.uk/news-and-insights/justifying-indirect-discrimination-and-flexible-working-decisions/

I would look locally for a childminder, some may be able to help out for the last 2.5 months.

Otherwise job agencies, nanny agencies.

Has she ever been alone at home? You said the secondary school is close to home but that is also 2-3 hours alone each day. We tried after Easter in Y6 that DD walked home alone and then was there until DH and I came. We have a neighbour working from home so DD had someone she could go to in emergencies (which never happened).
Going from not at home at all to each day after September is a big step.

Can you streeeetch it all out by putting in a flexible working request on the last day before the changes are made? With the very reasonable reason “I’ve tried everything to make the changes work”

Then Streeeetch again with appealing it?

If you’ve been there more than 2 years I think I’d consider (after the above) saying no and letting them go through the procedure of getting rid of you. They’re not going to fire you the first day ?

I live in Bath (Norland Nanny central), but we used to know a middle-aged Norlander who did exactly what you describe. (We knew her husband and the family she did this for from DH’s work).

She collected the kids, took them to clubs and/or oversaw them doing homework and fed them if parents weren’t likely to be home.

Far cheaper than flexi-boarding

I really appreciate people taking the time to reply, genuinely, but for my own sanity I won’t reply to any further suggestions regarding flexible working requests, finding a new job, asking school mums or using annual leave. As said a few times now, none of these are possible / solve the immediate issue.

I’d love a Norland Nanny @Madcats! I am talking to a few nanny agencies at the moment and I’ve made some local posts, hoping to find someone that way.

I think the chance of you getting someone reliable for 2 days a week for only 2 hours, who also drives is zero.
The taxi idea is better.

@jetlag92 where have I said it’s two days a week?

Managed to find someone, going to do a trial shift soon. Thank you so much to @PinkPhonyClub for the suggestion!!

We have a uni student for this through Koru Kids - 3 days a week school pick up for our primary age kids. She takes them to activities and then brings them home and makes them dinner. Because she’s a student she’s got loads of flexibility and happy to take on extra hours here and there if needed, babysitting etc. The kids love her.

Was going to say, maybe teaching assistant or lunchtime assistant would like to do this after their working day ends? If they haven’t got other responsibilities.