to think £5 an hour for a childminder in the suburbs is a bit steep?

[HidinginaHardHat]

We were interviewing several childminders today and the average price was around £5 per hour, i'm more used to paying around £3 an hour.

I appreciate they have to earn a living like the rest of us but when their hourly rate is nearly the same as mine is that really fair?

I probably am BU really aren't I.

It was me who compared them actually. I have probably complicated things . I was just trying to say that most childcare settings don't expect each parent to pay above minimum wage, unless it is one to one. I was trying to say that if they did, the average teacher would need to be on about £160000, which would plainly be ridiculous. So it is up to the CM to charge according to the number of mindees, not necessarily for each parent to pay NMW

even. lol.

I agree goinnowhere.

Someone (may have been you) also suggested parents should pay more if their child is one-to-one with a childminder, which I agree with. Otherwise what you're really getting is a nanny for £3.50 an hour.

Like I say,if you as a wp earn below a certain amount yourself,and you qualify for wtc you have 70% of childcare paid (was 80% pre DC )

So there is no reason for a registered childminder to earn less than minimum wage,really.

NMW is only 5.93 its going up to 6.08 soon though.

It was me. Basically a high earning parent can afford one to one care. A lower earning parent cannot, and should not pay the same.

My childcare costs are high - £900 per month. But childcare costs are not a life long commitment. Mine will come down by £350 soon when dd2 starts school. And then down again in a year or so when dd1 is old enough to come home from school herself. No-one said having kids was cheap.

Direct Gov says:

"There are different levels of NMW, depending on your age and whether you are an apprentice. The current rates are:
?£5.93 - the main rate for workers aged 21 and over
?£4.92 - the 18-20 rate
?£3.64 - the 16-17 rate for workers above school leaving age but under 18
?£2.50 - the apprentice rate, for apprentices under 19 or 19 or over and in the first year of their apprenticeship"

so your £3.00 is way under the average wage.

I wouldn't offend my babysitter by paying less than £5.00 per hour.

yeah its only 70% of costs you get paid now as well. I take home less than the minimum wage if you factor that in. I think most people who use childminders/nurseries are working for less than the NMW once you take childcare out

Vintage that 3 pound is just for one child. Its not all they are getting as no childminders I know only have 1 child.

Altinkum,Ithink we are on the same side:) and your maths is probably better!It is very sad though,that a cm should be earning less than minimum wage,given that ,like you say,you have all the EYFS stuff,risk assessments and the like.If you have several mindees,I guess this is manageable and liveable,but if you are like my lovrly cm who does not hit the 16 hr point for TCs and the like,it is an insult and she is very much below MW...

altinkum^EYFS, is not optional, all children under 8 are according to law, with any nursery,school,childminder etc... are mandatory to EYFS.
This isnt optional, its mandatory and if this isnt done, registration will be revoked.^

Thing is though, nursery/preschool/chilminder/school etc under 5 isn't obligatory so I really don't see the point completely in the EYFS; espeically not for childminders. They have to jump through so many hoops (and I don't mean forgoing health & safety and child protection) but I think CM costs would be lower if CMs were trusted to care and entertain our children without the EYFS.

Yes, I know it's for one child. And if friends had their kids over at mind and my babysitter was looking after their kids, I'd expect them to pay her for their chidlren too.

I paid my babysitter £5 for my dd before I had ds.

mavis so why don't you pay her NMW?

SlackSally, a poster earlier in the thread worked out what a teacher would get per hour, per child. I felt that the two jobs were not really comparable and said that the only thing that they both did was additional work when the children were not there.

I did more 'out of hours' work as a teacher than as a CM, but the amount of paperwork for CM was disproportionate to the number of children I was minding iyswim. Also, when I was teaching, the children went home at 3.30, so even working after school I had time to do lots of paperwork before the end of a normal work day while a CM would still be actively looking after children until 5 or 6.

I dont believe my ex childminder did any paperwork for ds when he was there.

I probably should...I would if she asked...its another £3.60 pw...she is worth it though!

Meant to add, that sometimes after school times are expensive because they use a place that you could maybe fill with an all day mindee (depending upon the age of the child)

dd loves her and she is genuinely fond of dd!dd cries when we leave...says it all to me unless she thinks "Get me away from this terrible mum!"