I don’t want my DD to be an Au Pair for a single dad

[Cyanbadmintonplayer]

Hi,
My DD is 19, we live in Germany but we are a British family. DD really wants to give a go at being an Au Pair for a couple of years while doing open uni.
Shes using an agency and has been matched with a single dad and his 7 year old daughter, from what I can gather no mother on the scene.

He wants DD to take his child to and from school everyday, and then to and from
clubs every evening bar 1 and Saturday.
No cleaning expectations, no need to drive (tube or taxi depending). She would need to make dinner for the child 4 days a week and a packed lunch for between activities on the Saturday. Occasional babysitting but this could come with an extra payment.
DD would get some time off over school holidays but would occasionally be asked to travel with them.
The pay would be £150 p/w, food and accommodation provided (large room with en-suite), travel card provided, phone bill paid for. DD would like to see if a gym membership would be possible on top of this but doesn’t want to be greedy.

It all sounds good I know but I hate the thought of her working for a single dad!
It seems a lot less safe and significantly riskier. I’m also worried that it might not be the safest area she’d be living in (London S/W).

AIBU thinking DD should wait it out for a different family and working for a single man is just too risky?

I’d say it’s less risky than sending a 19 year old off to live in student halls at university. When I was in halls I was sharing a flat with 3 other guys I’d never met until the day I moved in, plus probably 100 guys aged 18-25 in the same building.

She would just be in a house with one other man, his child also in the same home. I think her odds of being safe are much better here!

Same experience in France. Then there were the more pleasant men who were nonetheless certain I wanted to sleep with them.

I’m also worried that it might not be the safest area she’d be living in (London S/W).

This made me do a double take! An SW postcode screams "I'm a middle to upper class yuppie / yummy mummy (or daddy as it happens)". The average property price in SW London is £1m.

Of course it's a big area, but it's not like she's going to Croydon or anything like that. Do you know whereabouts in SW?

Maybe. On the other hand, younger men are less confident. Middle aged predators have had time to hone their craft and are likely to have more power over a younger, inexperienced woman.

Goodness me OP. The only danger she will face there (outside of the usual danger women face anywhere in the world) will be death by yummy mummy once-over stares, heart-attack-inducing Waitrose (a posh supermarket) prices, and little accessory dogs growling at her from the handbags they're being toted around in.

Yeah the older I get the more I realise the capacity of so so so many middle aged men to find themselves excited by a 19yr old girl in their house daily. I’d be surprised if he doesn’t at some point make a play for her. What’s he got to lose? And the chances of him feeling entitled to make a play are very very high.

Thats not to say she would be totally uninterested. At 19 I was naive enough to fancy (plenty of) much older men….

But I do think she would be quite vulnerable in all likelihood.

I don’t think £150 for 18 hours is very good pay, no. But she will have very low outgoings, perks like living for free in London and lots of spare time. If she is using an agency does the father have references from other au pairs? Men are not predators simply because they are single (also he is a widower which is no fault of his own) and the family will be used to be the dynamic of au pairs. However I would probably try to find out why the previous au pair left

It’s generally very safe around there but if she ventures further into Clapham North, Stockwell etc she might want to be careful with phone and bag. According to a local forum there have been muggings in Clapham junction and Northcote Road this year so personally I’d just be careful if she ventures there.

I’ve seen women of OP’s DD’s age and older wandering around on buses and streets with expensive cameras, phones on show in loads of areas and I just want to tell them to be careful. I don’t say anything though.

I think the key thing would be the agency – how ready are they to help her if anything arises, and is their help available 24/7 or at least most of the time?

I've read about au pairs who were hit on by the husband, but the wife in denial merely ignored it or kicked the au pair out (leaving them high and dry in a foreign country). I think going alone as a young person to live in more grown people's house in a foreign country is inherently dangerous, but rewarding with the right safety measures / support. It is a very, very nice area FWIW.

I met a German girl in a youth hostel in London. She turned up one midnight on the run from her AuPair job for a very wealthy family. The dad of her charge started wining/dining her and made a move as soon as the mother was away on a work trip.
She booked a flight back home a day later.

... And we were in Kensington so not like the postcode matters.

(Just context for OP to not worry – I know you may be a local)

It's always good to be more careful and listen to the locals, but don't overworry yourself with statistics, anecdotes, etc. Take a look at this article which is like many other similar articles:

https://propertyclub.nyc/article/most-dangerous-neighborhoods-in-london

Do you really believe Westminster (where plenty of MPs and high level civil servants stay) and Chelsea (synonymous with lip fillers and layabouts trying to recover from private school trauma) are the 2 most dangerous neighbourhoods in London?

There are probably muggings on every road in London. Slightly more rough areas tend to be interspersed with the nice areas, but plenty of low level crime takes place in the nice bits too. Help is usually plentiful and at most you learn an expensive lesson. It's not like ACTUAL rough areas in London where you have to clutch and hide your belongings.

Every part of London in general is pretty dangerous to me (I grew up in one of the safest Asian cities in the world) but probably no less dangerous than other major Western/European cities, assuming OP's DD grew up in one.

My concern would be agency support if all goes awry, not the area

I used to work as an aupair in my youth, the States and England. In England I stayed with a single father and we got on great. He never hit on me, not all men are scum. I actually preferred working for him because there was no jeallousy from his side if the children would come up to me wanting a cuddle for ex. Their mum was in a mental hospital so I think I filled in a female void in the children's lives. It was really a lovely experience! Sometimes, if the mum is insecure and feel bad about not being around while the aupair and the children create a bond it can be really difficult for the aupair. I had to change families once because the mother just screamed at me every day for perceived slights "you did not put the right socks on for this outfit" or " avocados dont go in the fridge" 😄 when I got older I unserstood that the violent outbursts werent about me but I endured some horrible months. So Id say go with the single father!

I totally understand your concerns. It’s completely normal to worry about your children, adults or not, living away from home especially in a different country . I’m not sure she is at any more risk though than If she worked for a couple. Can you set up a video call maybe, I’m sure as a father to a daughter himself he’d understand.

for me it would be the intensity of a single parent vs a couple.

Not whether it was a father or mother who was sole parent.

I think the comments that bother me most are the ‘poor widowed man. Of course she should help him’ ones

The only thing that matters is the level of risk. No woman should put herself at risk to service the needs of a ‘poor man’.

As I said earlier, having read a few au pair stories previously, I don't think a woman being there would necessarily make it safer, as horrible wives (in denial) or oblivious wives do exist.

I think being an au pair to any employer is inherently risky, but may be worth the tradeoff if living in London is her dream. It sounds like very few work hours, and the rent in that area would be at least £1000 per month for a small room, let alone a big private en-suite space like she's getting. The area is very safe.

I would take all the usual precautions a solo travelling female would take. Emergency contacts, built-in lock on door plus travel lock on door (they make indestructible ones, unless he's got a chainsaw or something), agency support, etc.

Of course the single dad may good and all that but what if he isn’t. Why to take the risk? However, if I were the dad I wouldn’t take a manny or male au pair to look after a little girl either.

Thank you.

We have done some additional research today and asked more questions.

• The room has a lock, it’s the only room on the top floor and when she asked how much privacy she had he replied with “the room has a lock and there are not other rooms on that floor, I can’t remember the last time I went up there, child might come up occasionally but she does know she isn’t meant to”
• He explained she is welcome to have guests but would rather they stay in her room, there are two “guest rooms” but one functions as his parents room and the other shares a floor with his DDs room so he would rather there weren’t any strangers staying there

DD reached out to both of the previous Au Pairs, both have replied.

• First Au Pair worked for them for two years when the child was 3 and 4. She said that it was a nice place to work, she never felt at risk and only left as she was ready to go to uni in a different city. Obviously this was during Covid partially so not the exact same circumstances.
• Second Au Pair worked for them until August Last year, she was asked to leave when the mother was terminally ill and the father took leave from work to care for her. She said that it might be different without the mother present but she never had to get the child ready for school and even at 5 the child would wake up, wash her own face and get dressed, her mum or dad would sort breakfast, her hair and help with teeth brushing. She think the hours sound accurate but was asked to babysit around once a week, usually paid £25-£30 to do so. She said the main annoying thing was they would seem a little irritated if she used a taxi when the tube was an option and she had to be quite assertive in saying they wouldn’t have made it on time if they didn’t or explain that the bad weather would have made it very unpleasant. She also explained they are one parent one language household and the dad only speaks to his child in his native language, which can feel exclusionary at times.

My concerns with the Clapham area are the only two times I’ve heard about it in the last 5 years were following the Sarah Everard attack and around the time of the acid attack this year. I don’t think I’ve heard of any similar crimes in areas I’d define as safe in London such as Richmond/Kew, Hampstead, Wimbledon etc.

DD is even more up for it now especially as the others were able to stay more than a year.

There is a great nanny network in this area so I'm sure she's make friends at the school gate.

My DD is a live-in nanny (for 3) nearby.

Sounds great. She should go for it!

Really curious why someone from Germany has better chances than someone French?

Being an au pair to a 7 yo is much easier and more fun than a traditional role with several children including a baby and/or toddler. Maybe more of a big sister role rather than nappy changing, trying to get toddler to eat their dinner etc.

Your DD will have the school day free for her own studies and activities, exploring London etc.

Sounds like the dad is going to be at work a lot.

Clapham is no less safe than those other areas you mention. It is full of young families, good transport connections.

Not all men are perverted rapists