To think that you get all sorts who respond to adverts needing a childminder / babysitting

[LostShepherdsPie]

Perhaps I advertised in the wrong place or asked the wrong people but I'm quite surprised by the sheer number of unqualified and inexperienced and the most ridiculously unavailable people that have reached out to me in response to hearing I need a childminder and wanting to charge quite a bit for their services!

To give some context I already have a nursery place which I am happy with but I need an additional day and there's a bit of a wait before that day opens up so in the meantime I was asking around about childminders or family friends etc to help out with DS.

So far I have had rather long winded and pointless back and forth messaging with people who I had wrongly assumed read my initial message, some delightful messages include;

I can help out! I'm local and looking for work now both my kids are in school / nursery.....(Few messages later) I'm only available between 12.30 to 2.30pm to cover the working day you needed and I want to charge £15 and hour. I have no previous experience of childminding and definitely not registered.

'I've taken care of my nieces and nephews before so yes I do have experience.'

I'm a student so I'm actually in classes 4 days of the week and only available on two mornings of the week (neither of which you requested)

Where are you advertising? Is it Childcare.com?

It sounds as though your advertisement / initial messaging was unclear: you’ve interchangeably mentioned looking for childminders and babysitters, and “asking around about childminders or family friends etc to help out.” A professional childminder isn’t the same thing as a friend of a friend to “help out.” I’d revise your advertisement to be really clear that you’re looking for formal professional childcare, because the impression that you have some odd job babysitting for somebody with spare time looking for extra cash is what’s getting you the undesired responses.

Use childcare.com

Have you looked on Bubble? You can post a job with times and browse people’s qualifications and reviews from other families etc

This seems like a really risky way of finding a babysitter.

Find a childminder. They must be registered, so you can find their Ofsted details online, and they also usually advertise online on local websites. They charge usually 7 pound/h where I live.

I agree look on childcare.co.uk, you can see childminders local to you who have spaces and you can advertise as well. There is a charge to advise and to contact the childcare providers unless they are members.
The ones local to me are around £6 an hour, some offer 1 day a week others do not

I think sitters.co.uk still exists too. Plenty of registered childminders seeking evening work when I looked.

If you want a registered childminder, speak to the early years/childcare team or family information service at your local council - they probably have a web page.
They can give you contact details for all the local registered childminders.

Be really careful who you choose. When interviewing, ask them why they like working with children. If they say ‘ the hours are convenient’ or other self-serving nonsense I’d turn them away.

Are you just randomly asking strangers on the internet who would like to look after your kids? Is that not extremely risky? I recently asked on a local Facebook page for recommendations for a piano teacher for my DD. It suddenly struck me that I was actually prepared to send DD to someone’s house who I had no knowledge of, and no knowledge who else may be in the house at the same time (teenage sons, partner etc) and leave her there, and I realised how insane that was, and it scared me how I hadn’t realised earlier what a massive error of judgement that had been on my part.