to think teenagers should be cheaper than qualified people?

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We regularly use an agency for babysitting and have a level 3 qualified registered childminder who is in her 50s babysit for us.
She is fab, but for times when we are (literally) down the road we’d love to have a cheaper babysitter in their teens. Our children have never woken up in their sleep and are in bed by the time we go out. We could literally be home in 5minutes.

Loads of people advertising their teenager sons and dds are available for babysitting on Facebook (obviously would check them out first) but AIBU to think teens these days expect a lot!
So have 3 I have casually enquired about have want more or the same as the agency rate I pay for our qualified, experienced babysitter!

I am not that old and babysat a lot in my teens - I never expected the (equivalent) rate these teens expect.

Are people going to book them? Are they out of touch or is it me who is BU?

(For record even though this is AIBU I am not in a fury and will just carry on using our babysitter - so no drama 😁)

£15 an hour and in cash?

DS17 has got a sought after local Sat job, on his feet for 9 hours a day, dealing with mardy people and difficult circumstances - take home I think about £6.50 an hour. It has taught him so much about the value of money and work.

My 15+ (to 19 year old) teenagers charge £6 a hour for babysitting. They don't do childminding ie. babysitting in the day when little ones need entertaining etc. But they do getting ready for bed, ensuring they eat (if dinner is cooked already) and bedtime stories. Once children are asleep it's just a matter of checking on them and listening out. They don't babysit young babies. They don't pretend to be exerts but love children,

They do charge a Minimum evening fee of £15 as I drive them there and back (so that parents can go to bed when they get home- they babysit local only up to about 4 miles away at most), which isn't worth it for £12 if someone just wants a couple hours @£6/hour. As they get older they can make their own way there and back if very local.

My lot turn up 10-15 mins early and don't worry if its 10 mins past the hour.

Sometimes they do it as pairs and still charge £6/hour (ie they take home £3 each) if it a new family- so that they get to know family & children well first before going solo.

At part time work - which is hard work!- they get paid £4.60-6.50 an hour depending on age and NMW in these big companies

I think it's crazy if teenagers are charging £15/ hour for babysitting unless they have to catch tube or bus there and have to catch Uber home

So, yanbu OP

@BuffySummersReportingforSanity

Where did you see my kids didn't work at all? I said to aim higher and build their cv, not do nothing...

What are they doing, then? What are the credible, structured jobs they are doing that pay above NMW and are open to unqualified teens with no other experience, and how are they making themselves the preferred candidates above the many fully grown adults no doubt jostling for the roles?

I’d be interested to know this too.

My 18 year old DD charges £8p/h and £10p/h after midnight and is happy to supervise bedtime. I think this is a fair rate for the South East.

they are in competition with people with superb cv, and it's their own interest to go for the best they can from a young age.
Of course they work, but not for peanuts unless it's a specific interest. It's not all about the money, it's about the big picture. I suspect you have a great deal of social capital. The majority of teenagers in this country wouldn't have a chance of a job paying more than minimum wage. We're talking here about teenagers who do babysitting who are typically in mid teenage years, in other words no A levels as yet, and possibly no GCSEs yet. We're not talking about 19 year olds in their 2nd year at uni.

The price of something is what people are prepared to pay for it. So either you pay what they want or you don't get their service.

I used to get £20 a night for 7 - 11:30pm, back in 1995 as a 15 year old when children were already in bed. There was another family with a boy of 6 and a girl of 4 who I used to sit for for the whole day, while their single Mum was at work. I'd have to cook and entertain them for the whole day and I used to get £5 per hour (again, this was '95/'96).

I think I'd pay a teenager £6 per hour if the kids were in bed, but I wouldn't leave under 4 year olds (even if they were asleep when we left) with a babysitter who was under 18 and I would never ask a babysitter to do bedtime with children who were young enough to still need "putting to bed" or a bath/story/sleep bedtime routine.

I would only use a teenager (15/16/17) who I already knew, and who my children were familiar with, I wouldn't choose a random kid from Facebook! Luckily my DC are too old to need a babysitter these days, as I suspect I wouldn't pay enough to satisfy the teenagers looking for gigs!

A lot will depend on how many babysitters there are locally.

When DD babysat there was four of them who had a regular set up with multiple families, all of them were the roughly the same age.

When they all went away to uni the one 15yo who babysits atm charges £10 per hour because she can.

DD is home for the summer and none of the usual playscheme or kids activities are running. She was offered considerably more per hour to do some babysitting for people to cover childcare gaps.

I find it cheeky that some teens think they should be paid more per hour babysitting than qualified and experienced childcare staff get paid per hour for doing a skilled and demanding job.

We pay our 19 year old/ experienced babysitter, £10 per hour

£15 an hour for a teenager LOL. They probably get some business I guess, but hell no. In honesty though I wouldn't have an unregistered teen do it unless I knew them in some capacity (I'd pay them of course).

@LolaSmiles

I find it cheeky that some teens think they should be paid more per hour babysitting than qualified and experienced childcare staff get paid per hour for doing a skilled and demanding job.

Most are doing it at evenings or weekends when there’s not childcare staff available so that will account for most of the difference

My 15yr old charges $12 per hr. She is booked 3/4 nights a week most weeks. She has been asked to do some daytime during the holidays which will include taking the kids to the park, playing I'm the garden,.making lunch etc. She is charging $50 9am - 3pm. (She changes me $10 per hr to babysit her younger siblings).

@LolaSmiles

I find it cheeky that some teens think they should be paid more per hour babysitting than qualified and experienced childcare staff get paid per hour for doing a skilled and demanding job.

that's a weird reasoning. It's supply and demand. It's only cheeky if it's way above market rate and they won't get it.

Do you honestly care if others paid less than you when you go for a job or a pay rise, even if they are more "qualified" and experienced? I don't.

We pay £10 per hour and make sure there’s money for food (if they want Chinese) or order them a dominoes on the app.

We’ve 2 scatty dogs as well though.

LOL at paying a 14 or 15 year old £15 ph 😂😂

Yanbu op.

I'm happy to pay a fiver an hour and free access to the fridge. Well behaved dc who's already in bed.

If I was paying £15 an hour I'd expect a fully qualified grown up not a teenager.

When my ds was younger I used to pay £20 an evening, we were usually out about 3 hours.

However, as a general principle, I think qualified people should get paid more than unqualified people but I don't think teens should be paid less because of their age (and disagree with the age-related changes for the minimum wage - the job is the same whether a 16 year old does it or a 25 year old does it).

If I was paying £15 an hour I'd expect a fully qualified grown up not a teenager.

to tutor the kids, or to do exactly the same thing?

I am very uncomfortable about paying someone purely based on their age, it should be about the job surely.

The incentive to employ inexperienced people by having to pay them a lower minimum wage is debatable, but for babysitting? My youngests have more fun with a teen playing football and video games with them than with an adult babysitter... Should the teen be paid less?

(on another note, I don't pay my own kids to babysit their siblings because I am mean like that, but I do pay market rate when I employ someone!)

£15 babysitting, even for a second year uni student, is ridiculous when the national living wage is £8.91 and less than £6.56 for that age. Kids these days...

@pleasedonttextmyman

Less than £10 an hour for a teen babysitter is insulting frankly. £15 is a bit high, but if the demand is there, why not.

I am always so shocked at how tights people are about childcare (in general, not an attack against the OP). Spend a fortune with your cleaner, your hairdresser, your nail technician, window cleaner.. fine.

Giving more than a tip for someone giving up their time to look after your children? Seriously. It's embarrassing.

Is it ok to think it's outrageous if you don't have any of those people?

Surely qualifications and/or experience count for something for any job. If you pay first aid trained, DBS checked, qualified professional nannies £8-£10 for evening babysitting (mostly watching Tv)... why on earth should a teenager get any more? They would be a t the bottom of scale.

Okay so after reading the comments and some of the posters stating they think £15 Is fair for a teenager or that their teenager is babysitting for that rate, I think I might quit my job and take up babysitting. I work in a regulatory field managing teams and I barely make that!

You wouldn't take a job for £4 or £5 an hour, would you...

Plenty of 16/17 year olds do exactly that. That's the hourly rate for an untrained, unskilled, unqualified teenager. That's how much they'd get paid working as a waitress, or in a shop and reflects the fact that they won't have as many outgoings as an adult.

@Manycupsoftea

Surely qualifications and/or experience count for something for any job. If you pay first aid trained, DBS checked, qualified professional nannies £8-£10 for evening babysitting (mostly watching Tv)... why on earth should a teenager get any more? They would be a t the bottom of scale.

Quite. I wouldn't pay an unqualified teenager the same amount as a trained childcare professional, even if it took the same amount of time.

Much like I'm not paying a school girl the same amount of money to cut my hair as I would a trained hairstylist. I bet the teenager would do it faster anyway.