aibu in thinking I could do this in the summer holidays

[pinksquash13]

Hello everyone, first time poster but long time lurker.

I'm a 26 year old primary school teacher, living in the SE, with 4 years experience teaching age 7 to 11 incl children with SEN. I've recently bought a house on my own and I'm finding that my salary doesn't go very far anymore so am looking to earn some extra money. I have been considering getting a job in the 6 weeks holiday and potentially school holidays after that. I love children and i am ideally looking for childcare/nanny type job. I'd happilly look after 5 kids. What I'm here to ask you though is would I be an attractive employee....

I'm thinking about posting an ad stating the above and offering child care/nanny/doing homework or reading with children for any number of days in the 6 weeks I'm off. However, this is where I feel I may be unreasonable. ..to make it really worth my while I'd want at least £10 per hour. ...ideally more like £12 and to work for a minimum of 4 hours in one go.

With no children myself, I have no idea how much childcare costs and how working parents go about finding it. Does this sound viable to you? And how would I go about finding work. Thanks in advance

Advertise yourself as a nanny asap and I think that you will get work quickly. Charge £10 per hour and I think you will be fine.

One of my teaching friends worked in the school holiday playscheme for a couple of weeks in the summer, for extra cash. Lower pay, but more predictable and not being solely in charge was quite a relief after term time!

The posts about childminding are not really relevant to your situation as you would not be doing it in your own home.

Longer term, get a lodger or see if you can get a TLR.

How about offering a PA service for children with disabilities? The families would pay you using direct payments. Up north these get £10 an hour

Have you considered contacting places like Haven, Butlins etc (or more exciting places abroad)?

They may have child related jobs where you could live in. You may not get as much per hour but would have no living costs for 6 weeks.

£10 gross or net? I'm in Cambridge and nannies seem to charge about £9 or £10 net so I think you are in the right ballpark for rates.

Can you speak to a childminder who currently offers after school care but not holiday care and see if she will refer?

I think the issue you might have is parents not wanting to become employers for these short periods when there are lots of alternatives like holiday clubs.

Do you do babysitting? Can you sign up with sitters.co.uk? That can be all year round of course.

The parents dont need to be employees :-\ they op can be self employed and declare it herself though it'll likely be below the tax threshold!

Someone upthread mentioned a lodger. You can advertise for mon -fri lodgers if a full time one is not your thing. I appreciate this is not what you asked but its a long term option not reliant on your 6 week break

Plus under the rent a room scheme you get the first £4.something k tax free which makes it 40% or 20% more valuable than working a second job and getting the same gross.

Macdoodle, is that right? Ok.

As a parent using childcare, that would be one of my concerns so if it is ok, it would be worth making it clear early on.

I'm currently trying to finalize summer childcare arrangements for two ds aged 4 and 7 and would seriously consider a holiday nanny at 10 per hour. Am looking at 80 per day at the moment with hassle of two different drop off and pick ups so 100 but no drop offs sounds great. I'm nowhere near you though OP.

Plus the OP is already using her tax threshold in her main job so she will be taxed.

OP, does your teaching contract allow you to do this?

Personally i would prefer you over a qualified nanny as all my dcs are school age. When they were under 5 i would prefer an experienced (with under 5s) nanny.

I think there is a lot of demand for nannies who can look after children with sen. There agencies that specialize in that. I think one of them is called snap childcare or something like this?

I do agree that a lodger would be easier.

By the way if you look after children from more than one family you are not childminder (as you dont look after them in your house) therefore you dont need to register as cm. You are doing 'nannyshare'.the rates will not be 10 pounds from each family if you look after them on the same days but something like 7-8 pounds for each family so you still make money but the parents save a bit.

All the best luck, i would employ you if i wasn't sortet already.

I am looking for a summer nanny and have had a teaching assistant before and would happily have a teacher, and I pay 10 pounds an hour.

I've pm'd you, pinksquash.

If you are working as a sole care nanny you will be an employee and tax and NI should be processed by the family. You can't just declare yourself self employed - there are legal tests that must be met.

If you do ad hoc childcare you are more likely to be able to be self employed and you must register with HMRC and invoice the family.

The other thing you could do is babysitting!

You could do that right now, and not wait for the summer holidays.

If you are free from around 6 pm you would be even more valuable, as most nannies who do extra babysitting can't usually start until after 7 pm.

I used to use a primary school teacher from another village to babysit my DC.

Advertise on Childcare.co.uk or on Gumtree, MN local, Netmums local etc

Oh and a babysitter with SEN experience would easily earn over £10 an hour.

Families who have children with SEN can find it difficult to find babysitters. I think you'd find yourself booked up weeks in advance!

I read an article in The Times about two mums who hired a classroom assistant over the summer to look after their five children.

Thanks for all your helpful replies. Will respond more later. I'm in report writing hell currently.

Might look into babysitting aswell as this is something I could do. Lodger sounds like a nice earner but I don't have the space unfortunately. As many of you have pointed out I'm leaving it a little late so may not find nanny work this summer but I think I'll advertise just in case. Will need to look into declaring tax and employee/self employed laws. Thanks for all your help. I'll update if I find anything.

I would also tell people what you are doing and ask them to pass it on. I'm not sure about using an unknown person from childcare .co.uk but if the T A who lives next door told me she was doing this, I'dbe very happy.

The nice thing about babysitting is that if you have any movies you want to watch paper work that you need to get done you can usually do it while babysitting!

Bit of a dream job most times, really

register on holiday nanny www.holidaynanny.org/why-use-holiday-nanny

Hi, I've just hired a nanny forv6 weeks summer hols (only 2 days per week) as my DS's Pre-school is term time only. I'm paying £10 per hour and thats in Somerset. My hire is also a teacher. Good luck