Should my 14-year-old be paid for helping at holiday camps?

[aimee41]

Dd 14 has been doing a hobby for 8 years now and has recently been asked to help at holiday camps. The children attending pay £40 a day to attend. There is obviously hall hire but no other expenses for the coach. When dd was asked to help last time we didn’t ask re payment, I guess we hoped the coach would offer.
Dd has now been asked again. On the one hand she would do it for free, but I don’t want her exploited. There are sometimes other helpers but they are older and help in regular classes and I am pretty sure get paid. Then there are other volunteers but these are mostly mothers running refreshments stands at particular events, not teaching children. Has anyone else experience of this? Thank you

If not paid then she should at least have a discount/freebies for the hobby or training sessions she normally attends.

Is this a sports club that runs all the time and does occasional day camps in the holidays, or is it specific school holiday childcare? If the former it is probably entirely run by volunteers.

Of course there are other expenses. Unless they sit in an empty room all day, there will be equipment that needs buying/replacing. There will be compliance costs, advertising etc.

that aside...

It's good experience for your DD.
It's good for her to learn to give back to her community.

Either way they will have a lot of expenses other than hall hire - insurance, training, equipment etc

It’s a dance club that runs several times a week but is definitely not run by volunteers. The leader has it as her full time job, running several classes for different ages each week

Given her age there may be issues over her being employed.

Are the other adults paid?

If yes I might suggest some sort of 'gift' would be in order

There are strict regulations about employing under 16s so even if the others are being paid, they may not want to offer paid employment, I'd look at it as great experience that can go on her CV, it is really hard for teens to find any sort of paid work at the moment so any volunteering opportunities are really useful.

My son has attended sports camps before and has helped out on a voluntarily basis. It’s a good way of gaining skills and experience.

Is it a holiday camp organised by her hobby sport club, or a professional organisation. If it’s just a summer camp run by her netball club, for example, I’d say no. If it’s a national company, then yes.

Incidently, hall costs a lot more than people realise.

I was thinking particular expenses for the holiday club. There were 25 or so children , so £1000 coming in for each day the camp runs. There is minimal equipment, though obviously is insurance

It’s not a national company, just a local dance school

Hall cost is £12ph as we have had parties there, we are not in London or SE

So it’s looking like she might just have to accept it. In the past an older helper was there, and I’m pretty sure did get paid but now the teacher seems to be planning to use dd instead

Of course she should be paid! How many hours is she doing? It's a business making a tidy packet. The owner is pulling a fast one there. If she does it free again it will become difficult to ask to be paid.

It is 6 hours each day, she’s been asked to do 3 days at half term

It would depend on how much enjoyment your daughter gets from helping out. If it's something she's passionate about then it will be great experience for her and would look good on her CV. How does your daughter feel about it?

How do you know these others got paid? I doubt the teacher is making a fortune out of this if it's her full time job, they can only run so many classes a week in term time, so the holiday clubs probably subsidise the operation, but there will be lots of hidden running costs. Advertising, book keeping, lots of work on admin behind the scenes, following safeguarding rules etc.

I think she should be paid. If the owner is getting her to work for free instead of paying an older person then the teacher is exploiting her.

The hall is likely charged at a commercial rate for the dance group.

I think you would need to look at employment laws for under 16s. I think they're only allowed to work a certain number of hours.

They clearly don't intend to pay her so the options are do it voluntarily or accept that someone else will probably take her place quite happily. I know it is perhaps exploitative but it is really hard to get any sort of work experience at that age so I'd treat it as that and let her do it (if she wants to).

If the older helper gets paid, your DD should get paid.
I don't think it's right to expect her to do it for free "for the experience". She's already done it before. The teacher is getting an income from this, so she should pay her helper. If not money, she could give your daughter free classes.

Even ad hoc in holidays? Dd is accepting of doing it for free, but she has no real understanding of what is acceptable and I want to teach her to value herself and her time

I think it would be impossible at this point to legally pay your DD for this as she’d have to have a work permit and she’d be limited in the hours she could work.

But I do think the dance teacher should offer a decent discount on her next terms fees in return.

She can definitely ask to be paid. A tenner an hour is more than reasonable.

If she wants to be paid she probably won't be able to do it at all because it becomes very muddy with child labour laws.