Should I be honest with friend about her childcare issues

[Waiting4cakes]

So my friend has asked me for advice but I'm not sure I should be honest with her.
Friend has 3 DCs (9,6 and 5) and she and her husband work full time so for the past 3 years or so they have had a nanny look after the DCs during the week.
However they have never had a nanny for more than 6 months as they keep leaving. The most recent has handed her notice in after 2 months.

Usually when she tells me they have left I just say something vague and change the subject but she has asked me over text today why I think they are leaving.

But I believe the problem is my friend.
For example she tells the nannies not to give the DCs sweets but then if the DCs come home and tell her the nanny wouldn't buy them sweets she will tell the nanny off for not spoiling the DCs. If the nanny does buy the DCs sweets then she tells them off for not following her instruction.

She will ask then to work for an extra half hour or so and then forget to pay them for a few weeks.

She asks the nannies to do too much with the DCs so for example in the 3 hours between getting home from school to friend coming home from work she expects the DCs to have done.
All their homework, music practice for at least half an hour, have eaten something, have had at least an hour of exercise and outdoors time, to have made the DCs clean their room and the living room and kitchen, to have done a creative activity like painting or drawing and that all their school stuff is ready for the next day.

She has also refused to allow time off for illness or hospital appointment and made them take unpaid leave.

And that's just the stuff I know about.
So should I be honest with her and tell her I think it's her fault or should I just lie.

I doubt she will listen to your point of view, if that's what she's said. She sounds like she wants a slave. I would reply, saying, 'oh no-nightmare. Go for an older more experienced nanny next time'

Then she can't blame it on them being young and lazy-though when she can't get someone as anyone older and e oefi need will not want to work for her, she might think twice.

Does she have a chip on her shoulder about her status in the world?

oh no-nightmare. Go for an older more experienced nanny next time

That's good advice. Older, more experienced nannies might tell her where she's going wrong. Though if she isn't offering a proper wage (which seems likely), she won't even get any experienced nannies to interview.

I think someone else needs to tell her, not you, OP. It does sound like it will damage the friendship.

Oh god... deluded and insecure 😟 (at least as a nanny employer). Where's her husband in all this? Even if she's the one in charge of organising childcare, surely he'd get interested and involved if the situation is that bad?

She wants more than a nanny and the thing that would really irk me is the late payment of salary. I've had that before and it is worrying, if bills have to be paid, and embarrassing. She's taking advantage of younger nannies.
TBH, while I appreciate she's a friend, she doesn't sound like a very nice person if she treats people like this?

The nannies aren't thinking this through.

Make the kids do their homework outside and then they are getting fresh air at the same time. They can have an umbrella if it's raining or snowing (I'm not a monster ). Tie packets of sweets in the trees and get the kids to creatively design a sort of Heath Robinson "Sweet Accessor", and build it using the rubbish lying about in their rooms, and while whistling the tunes that they need to be practising for their music - or if they can't quite whistle, shout out the appropriate notes (A, A, C-sharp, G etc). They will both get and not get sweets (in the manner of Schroedinger's Cat). While the kids are locked expressing their creativity etc in the garden, Nanny can nip to the hospital and have her ears syringed or womb scraped or whatever.

All it takes is a bit of thought. Your friend is right - her nannies are lazy bastards!

On a more serious note - I can remember a newspaper report about a nanny taken to court for stealing from her employers. They had treated her "like a friend" - unfortunately that meant expecting her to be available at all times (She's a friend! Your friends help you out when you need a bit of childcare) for no extra cash, and paying her very little and very late. Her pay was often many weeks - often months - in arrears. In order to survive, she had taken comparatively small sums of money left lying around the house - not a nice thing to do; she should have tackled her employers, but possibly lacked the courage and self-confidence. She didn't steal ANYTHING like the amount she was owed. AN occasionally tenner or something.

As I remember she received a jail sentence - the judge, who must have been an entitled arse himself, said that what was most terrible was that she had been treated almost like family by her (aristocratic, as I recall) employers, and had betrayed their trust.

I thought the decision was awful. Yes - she deserved to be punished, but surely to God the employers should have got a dressing-down for not paying her adequately and regularly. I wish I could remember the details.

As Superpug has said - people rely on their salaries coming in at a particular time as they have bills to pay.

Salaries should be automatically paid by direct debit IMO, then no-one has t go cap-in-hand and ask for their money, which is humiliating, and n-one can forget to pay it.

Would your friend be okay with it if her salary was paid whenever her boss could be arsed? She isn't a nice person at all.

Tell your friend to ask her nanny's agency for feedback. The nanny won't be honest with her, in case she doesn't give a reference.

I like the suggestions from Batteries on the first page.

I'd be inclined to ask her "Do you us to work through it to see if we can find an answer?" And if she says yes, ask leading questions to help her work it out for herself. If she puts up resistance, you should probably let it drop if you want to keep the friendship. You're unlikely to be able to get past that resistance.

I don't think you can broach the subject without jepordising your friendship. If she hasn't worked it out herself then she is working very hard to avoid the obvious.

I'd reply with something like "Would you really like to hear my honest opinion? I love you to bits/think you're a great friend, but I really don't think you'll like what I say and I don't want things to get awkward.", then if she says yes, let loose!

I think that the stuff you have mentioned can definitely be put diplomatically to your friend.

Oh those poor children, such a lack of continuity.

I think she's already been blacklisted by the agencies and told as much and that's why she's asking! She doesn't sound the type to be asking for any altruistic reasons. All this makes her not only a poor employer but a poor parent. As for calling the nannies 'lazy' has she EVER looked after her own children long term doing what she expects of the nannies? I highly doubt it.

2kids2dogs that court case sounds awful but what's worse is it doesn't surprise me. I've had friends work for the aristocracy in varying forms and they can be a nightmare!

Ask her what SHE thinks and suggest she asks the agency.

From what you've said, I suspect she isn't someone who would take an honest comment from you very well. So what you say, depends on how much you value her friendship.

Absolutely, suggest she contacts the agencies and ask for honest feedback.
If she is a long standing very good friend then go for coffee and discuss it openly and honestly otherwise don't go there!
She could also canvass agencies to ask what out of her expectations would be deemed as reasonable but that would take some self awareness .....

Oh my goodness, the mum from hell as far as any nanny is concerned! Tell her, don't pull any punches either!

She sounds like she has no clue about how long it takes to do tasks that she would struggle with in the allocated time. To me a nanny is employed to be there in place of the parent for the time you are not there, not to have school things prepared for the next day and fit in 'enrichment' activities (yes to cook for children but not to clean or iron etc.). My kids need to chill out for a bit after school and I let them while I prepare food and then catch them to do homework and reading. I guess some people are less reasonable than others but it must have set off major alarm bells if nannies are leaving so often.

How about sending her a link like this so that she can see what she might be able to expect from a nanny? www.nannies4hire.com/tips/1058-responsibilities-of-a-nanny.htm
That way you can be helpful without having to spell things out for her yourself.

Oh my word what a nightmare!

I'd do something like "I don't know why they all leave - your children are so lovely" which possibly suggests that somebody else is not lovely, and then suggest getting feedback from the agency.

If you tell her the entire A-Z list of why she is a nightmare employer, she is likely to feel very defensive and won't take it on board.

Why don't you start with one of the issues and see how she reacts? I'd probably go for the pay one as it is the least personal. I'd say something like, "Do you think paying them late for overtime might be an issue? I know when I was their age, I never had any spare cash so it was really important to me to be paid on time."

If she becomes very defensive, you either shut up or give it to her both barrels and screw the friendship. But if she sounds receptive, you could mention one of the other problems.

I would tell her she needs to stop being a complete twat and to treat her staff with a modicum of respect. Talk about controlling behaviour
( bullying).
If she thinks she can do a better job she should raise the kids herself.

She doesn't really want to know! She wants you to reply OMG yes those lazy ass nannies tut tut. If you want to keep her as a friend stay schtum.

Send her some links to articles about how to have a good relationship with your nanny (see below - there's many more if you google) ... She could get the hint but if she doesn't (ie she says "but i do do this stuff") it gives you the opportunity to suggest perhaps from her nannies' perspectives it doesn't feel like she does. Asking questions like "do you think you could do what you ask a nanny ask do?", "do you think everyone has this problem with nannies?", "what impact do you think this many nannies is having on the kids?" And "what do you think you might do differently next time?" Might work better at helping her figure out for herself what the problem is than just telling her straight and help keep your friendship in tact.

uk.care.com/articles/hiring/8-ways-to-have-a-great-relationship-with-your-nanny/

www.nannyjob.co.uk/blog/nannies/how-to-keep-your-nanny-happy/

I would tell her. And I wouldn't care if she didn't like it. I don't think I could be friends with someone who treated people like this - especially not paying them.

A good way of assessing someone's character is the way they treat those who are socially inferior to them, employees, waiters, bar staff. Someone who does things like not paying a fairly low waged staff member for weeks and making their life hell to boot is not a good person.

I think you could also be sure that if anything ever happened to you and your social status dropped you wouldn't see her for dust.

It sounds like this friend may have some sort of baggage or hangup sbout her rights and her personal power. Moving the goalposts WRT things nanny should/ should not do and making unreasonable demands both smack of her throwing her weight around to assert herself.

Is she or her family well-to-do/ hung up on social class/ used to a culture where low status jobs like cleaning, cooking and child rearing are routinely contracted out?? It sounds a bit like she might be.