Cost of baby sitting

[Niloufes]

Our baby sister recently told us that she is putting her costs up to minimum wage per hour, £7.20 an hour. Am i being unreasonable to think this is too much? She comes round when our 3 year old daughter is asleep and waits until we get home. Only once has she woken up and needed a drink and so the sitter is just sitting watching tv the rest of the time. Is this a normal amount to pay? we paid £6 before. aibu?

I've never had to get a babysitter, but was thinking about it recently. We got a flyer from a local teen saying they charge 7 per hour plus fares and taxi home (which is 4 pounds bus fare and 15 pounds taxi) so a few hours out would be 40 pounds for the sitting before we had even gone out. Which i do understand, but does make it a very pricey evening. (the children would be in bed first so they probably wouldn't even see them)

I'm sure lots of other posters have written this already but I'm seriously shocked at £10 an hour for babysitting. I can't be the only person who could barely afford to go out if I had to add £50 on to the price. I pay a teenager £5 and a qualified nanny £7.50. Admittedly I live a long way out of London. I am an experienced journalist and recently discussed doing some shifts at my local BBC Radio Station. It would have been more lucrative for me to offer to look after the News Eds kids when she went out in the evening!!!

It's not so much that she's sitting watching TV for the money, I think it's in the unlikely event your daughter is unwell or needed first aid then this responsible person is there and I charge £10 an hour. I am also police checked and experienced with children I think this all makes a difference in how much I can charge parents for my services.

I think YABU. Question of supply and demand. I think you've been getting her on the cheap and still are at minimum wage

I've babysat for 20 years and the people you care about working for are the ones with nice kids who pay you decent money and don't take advantage. I get paid £10/15 depending ( I am a very spoilt nanny I admit) weekdays I get £15 any other times or other families I get £10.
Kids wake up all the time and lose the plot for all sorts of reasons and as a baby sitter you deal with all kinds of bodily functions and reactions. That I know how to deal with these situations is what you're really paying for.

I'm 26 and do a lot of babysitting in my area of Surrey. I charge between £7.50 and £8.50 per hour, but this is cheap for my area. Babysitting is my only source of income at the moment due to doing a full-time PhD, so I couldn't afford to get paid less than that. I'm booked almost every Friday and Saturday night, and have a regular after-school job once a week that involves picking kids up from school, helping with homework, entertaining them, breaking up fights etc. I'm DBS checked and have a first aid qualification, plus lots of experience with SEN. Quite a few of the kids I look after have SEN because of this experience. Why would I only charge £5 an hour when I'm fully booked charging more? I'm not a charity!! I would say 80% of the time I do actually have to do something with the kids, even if they are in bed when I get there, so it isn't just sitting watching TV.

£8-10 ph - we live in the south east and that's standard here

I could work almost every evening if I wished. There is no shortage of parents willing to pay between £7 and 8 an hour in this area. I often wish I could cut myself into several pieces to get to all the houses on the same night!

Pay your babysitter properly. £7.20 is not much in my opinion, I get 12.50£/h for babysitting. If your daughter wakes up at night choking, you won't say your babysitter only watches TV and eats snacks.

I get £8ph for babysitting. I'm fully qualified, Ofsted registered and insured, though. I always think it's the type of thing where it's worth paying a bit more for someone you trust, considering what you are leaving them in charge of

Hmmm tricky, cos strictly speaking minimum wage takes tax/NI into account and I bet she doesn't declare that.

My CM charges £5ph I would happily pay that and provide her with food drink and drop her home.

However, if you trust her and your child is comfortable with her then that's fair enough to pay the asking rate. Maybe ask a local FB page and see if anyone else is recommended and see what they charge? Xx

You are not paying her for what she does do. You are paying her for what she would have to do in a crisis.
People who work in the control room at nuclear power stations mainly sit there staring at screens. Is 6 quid an hour OK for that job? They're doing fuck all after all.

At the end of the day how much is your child's safety worth to you! Yes they may only sit there and watch TV but while your out the responsibility lies in their hands!

Wow, £15 a hour, I m a childminder and people don't want to pay £5 a hour! I do pay my babysitter £5 a hour and she is under 18!

Ok so babysitting is traditionally a cash in hand job for teens. With this in mind I pay a babysitter around £20/25 for an evening. My daughters,both uni students,and one of the B/F's is happy with this as there's always food & drink on offer plus it's tax free.
On the odd occasion,I've used an NNEB or similarly qualified person and had to pay their hourly rate which is fair enough.
I disagree with paying the minimum wage for a cash in hand relatively easy job.
Reference has been made to 'what if your child chokes' etc. Well,statistically, it's highly unlikely if they are asleep in bed and practically,they would dial 999 as anyone including us as mothers would and do whatever they could in the meantime to keep the child safe.
Bottom line is you can choose your sitters and choose what you are happy with according to your needs and that of your child (ren).
If you're not happy with min wage,tell her you can't afford it and thank her for her service,there are always reliable teens about who want to earn,get in touch with local youth groups or colleges and get someone recommended.
IMO,YANBU I couldn't afford to ever go out at these prices!!

I paid a teen that we know £7 per hour to watch my two, which is pretty much the minimum to pay. She 'hung out' with them, watching TV & then revising when they went to bed. Until My youngest was 3 I used family or friends - as I wanted someone I could trust totally and who was older.

It's not so much that she's sitting watching TV for the money, I think it's in the unlikely event your daughter is unwell or needed first aid then this responsible person is there and I charge £10 an hour.

It's pretty unlikely that the child will need first aid and if they do the babysitter doesn't have to be any better than the average parent. If the child is unwell the parents can be called home. I personally would never be a couple of miles away if I went out for the night so could get home in about 15 minutes. In the incredibly unlikely situation that there is a medical emergency an ambulance could be called.

Is she declaring this to the tax man?

I think my childminder charged £6 p/h but then again she had upto 6kids

I pay 4.00 an hour to some of my babysitters. I do pay them extra when I can but is all I can afford. I've had teenage babysitters and grown up mums babysitting. They're willing to work for it, would pay them 7.00 per hour if I could

I would be darn worried about leaving my child with someone who accepts such a low wage as £5/6 an hour because frankly, you get what you pay for.

We pay £10ph, north west. ( 3 kids who she will put to bed if needed, probably half the time that she has them). It's does add a lot to a night out but we have a fabulous baby sitter who I trust to look after the kids as well better than we would and I want her to know that we value her and want to come back.
When we can't afford it we don't go out.

Haha! Without a doubt, the very very worst babysitter I ever had was a so-called 'youth worker' who charged £8 an hour. I was desperate so I used her. She ate all of my posh biscuits (that were in the cupboard in a tin, not the ones I'd left out for her - along with pizza, drinks etc.) and then fell asleep on the fucking sofa before I got back. And it wasn't even late. Since then I've stuck to older kids of friends and neighbours' recommendations and they've all been absolutely brilliant.