My sister has said I've made things awkward but I disagree

[Robinson89]

I worked in child care for over 10 years, mainly as a nanny, and although I've changed professions completely now, I still occasionally babysit for some families during evenings and weekends. My rate is £10ph and has been for the last few years.

Last week my sisters friend (I don't know her personally) asked if I'd be interested in babysitting her children occasionally. I said yes and told her to pass my number on and let her know to ring me if she had any questions. Yesterday I received a text from the friend asking if I could babysit this upcoming weekend as she wanted to go on a night out for her friends birthday. It would be for around 6 hours until 11:30pm. I told her no problem, asked for her address and explained that my rate was £10. She replied shortly after explaining that she was looking to pay around £8.50 as that is all she could afford. I sent a polite text back to say I understood her position, but unfortunately my rate was £10 and it is what I charge all my families. I said if she changed her mind then to let me know and I'd happily babysit for her.

I never heard anything about it again until my sister phoned me this morning to say that her friend was really disappointed that she couldn't go on her night out and why would I expect £10 for basically putting the kids to bed and sitting on the sofa watching tv all night . I have no idea why my sister is even entertaining this, and frankly I'm a bit hurt. It has nothing to do with the fact that I'd be sat watching the tv whilst the kids are in bed. It's the fact that I'm giving up my weekend (I work full time myself) to babysit her children and not being able to spend time in my own home with my own family. I'm not desperate for the money so my down time is really important to me. I'm also a qualified trained professional who knows what to do in the event of an emergency. AIBU?

As an adult £8.50 is under the current NMW - which makes it especially cheeky given it is a weekend evening and you are experienced.

….and in sole charge of the people (presumably) most precious to this woman.

I work in financial services, for a company, one of whose major purposes is to step in in the event someone doesn’t deliver up on a trade.

Customers pay fees to join as our members. A major reason they’re paying those fees (and, in some cases, are legally required to be our members) is so we will pay up if something goes tits up.

It’s the same here. Yes, you’re babysitting. Easy if all’s ok. But what if one of the kids becomes suddenly ill? She’s relying on you to make the right decisions at the right time, potentially to save your kid’s life.

Yeah, it’s an outside chance. But it’s a risk management thing. I’m in LONDON and pay my regular Tuesday night babysitter £12 per hour, which is what she asks because she is a trained, qualified professional and I trust her to do the right thing to mitigate the risks if the worst happened.

What the fuck is WRONG with people?

Why doesn’t your sister do it for free

YANBU. Your sister is the one making it all awkward.

I don’t know why it made London all upper case. Makes me sound like a right bellend - I’m in LONDON all you little people not in LONDON.

Not intentional, sorry.

£60 is expensive for a night’s babysitting. Of course it is - the OP is a fully qualified experienced professional. If the hirer is happy to have a 14 year old whose sole qualifications are a Brownie first aid badge and knowing the rules of monopoly then they will probably be able to find someone who charges less.

It is similar to who you ask to fix your dripping tap - a qualified plumber or Fred the odd job guy. Fred is a lot cheaper but there is always the risk that he will botch it……

YADNBU

What a fucking cheek, unbelievable.

Sorry your sister has behaved like this, it’s definitely not you, and I don’t blame you for feeling hurt. You have done nothing wrong whatsoever and she is being extremely unreasonable and disrespectful

• Piglet89

I don’t know why it made London all upper case. Makes me sound like a right bellend - I’m in LONDON all you little people not in LONDON.

Not intentional, sorry.*

And even though your rate of £10 is more than reasonable, it really is completely up to you what you charge for your time, and so even if you were asking for £60 per hour that would be your business and up to potential customers to take it or leave it. No one’s being forced to enlist your services. Your sister’s a twat frankly – if she gave the impression to a mate of hers it would be cheaper and didn’t communicate properly between all parties then that’s her problem. The mate is also an idiot as well for trying to plead that she couldn’t afford it – pathetic. She’s a grown adult, her finances aren’t your problem.

I don’t know why it made London all upper case. Makes me sound like a right bellend - I’m in LONDON all you little people not in LONDON
🤭🤭🤭

I live forty miles from LONDON!
Go me

@the80sweregreat well done for getting so near to

LONDON.

I used to live in LONDON but now live in the north west That was as small as I could make it.

@MaskingForIt

YANBU. I want a Jaguar but I can only afford a Vauxhall, so I drive a Vauxhall. My friend has a Jag and doesn’t feel bad that I don’t.

Why didn't your sister offer to watch her friend's kids.

Out of - you know - friendship?

[quote Piglet89]@the80sweregreat well done for getting so near to

LONDON.[/quote]
😀

Nope. If the op had done a favour , all her sisters friends would have wanted their children looked after for about three pounds an hour!
It's not on
That's her rates. You stick by that.

I’m not convinced she was expecting to pay even £8.50ph. It sounds like she was hoping to pay even less and only came up with that figure after you quoted £10ph. Otherwise an extra £9 would make no difference.

@residentkaleidoscope

£60 for a night of babysitting, I'm must be in the wrong profession lol. You did nothing wrong OP, ignore your sister.

Are you in a profession where you earn less than the national minimum wage?

It is £8.91 and then the OP will have pay NI contributions.

She stayed at home instead of going out because your rate was £9 more than she wanted to spend? Nine fucking pounds?! She’s either a liar or an idiot or both.

£9?

Seriously? You'd be lucky to get much change from a cocktail.

Prob best if she stayed home, she clearly couldn't afford it. Either that or she was using you as an excuse to get out of a night out she didn't want to attend.

'Awww no I can't get a babysitter, I'm sooooo disappointed'

Either way you haven't done anything wrong. £60 for a Saturday night seems reasonable to me.

You ‘prevented’ this woman going out because you charged her £9 more than she wanted to pay The problem here isn’t you, she just couldn’t afford it. She should either have gone out for one less hour or had a couple less drinks.

My DD is 17 and gets £10 an hour plus tip, So YANBU to refuse to lower your price

£60. Them’s the rates.

You pays your money, you takes your choice.

@Robinson89 you have done NOTHING wrong.

While £10ph is reasonable, it is slightly galling to pay that for someone sitting on the sofa watching TV. It cost us nearly £100 to go to the cinema last week because of 5 hours babysitting.

When I was a teenager I got a fiver for the whole evening

(yes, I realise the OP is qualified and you’re paying to the “what if there’s a house fire / child wakes up / needs to go to A&E” etc etc. Don’t @ me”

The friend has been very stupid. A childcare professional who is the sister of one of her friends - a fantastic option for a worry free night out.

The government want to turn us into a "high wage, high skill economy". People are presumably going to have to get used to paying more than 10 quid an hour for any and all services.