to avoid paying agency fees for nanny we are interviewing on Sat

[PDR]

Ok, I have registered with a London agency for a maternity nurse but I have not signed anything yet...

All they have done is email me a few CVs and arrange an interview with 1 nanny.

I have just found the same nanny listed on Nannyjob and I want to cancel our interview through the agency and arrange on privately to avoid paying the £95 + VAT/week agency fees they are going to charge if we employ her through them.

AIBU to call the agency in the morning to cancel the interview and tell them we have found somebody locally, then call the nanny myself and arrange to meet?

I'm not sure if doing it in these particular circumstances would put you in a dodgy position legally, but it probably would mean the agency would refuse to place the nanny in future. If I was her I wouldn't agree to it for that reason.

However, I don't think agencies do very much for their money - certainly nothing you can't do yourself. In future use nannyjob/gumtree/netmums/childcare.co.uk and recruit yourself.

YABU

Forget what the strict letter of the law is.....what is the "right" thing to do.....?

If your darling child asked you how one should behave.....is this what you would advocate. I don't think so.

Do the (morally) right thing and put it down to experience.

oops, just read your later post and you say you have decided to go ahead.....well done you (!) and you can join me now on the moral high ground

I find this discussion very interesting as a maternity nurse. Mums are hiring someone to care for their most precious. They want only the best, yet want to quibble over paying a reputable agency for the privilege.

Agencies dont just have nannies on their books, they put you through a hard interview process, asking questions that as a parent you would probably not think about. They phone and sometimes have to pay to check whether qualifications/ certificates and valid etc, they chase up numerous references and write up a file. Whether you are a nanny or a maternity nurse agencies do not put your fee down to get theirs, this never happens.

Maternity nurses and nannies enjoy going through agencies as they provide support (often needed in full on maternity jobs) and they also provide you with good families as you may not realise it but you are being vetted too! You are not the only one who can make a choice!

Also if things dont go right once the job has started (which can happen for one reason or another) or the maternity nurse becomes sick or has a family crisis before or within your job, then the agency will try and find you a replacement and most likely will. If you go it alone then this is not an option. To be honest a loyal maternity nurse would inform the agency if you wanted to hire her behind their backs, and Im sure loyalty is a quality you are looking for!

Anyway! Rant over! Im glad you have decided to go through the agency but feel the only reason you did this was because you felt too late to cancel. I hope you find the maternity nurse you are looking for but treat her with more respect than you are the agency she is working for.

I've seen that you have decided to do it via the agency, however I have to comment anyway as I work for an agency.

You had received CV from the agency and arranged the interview, by arranging the interview that is acceptance of the terms whether signed or not and they could claim an intro fee which would be a lump sum of a fair amount of the margin you will have taken from them.

The agency would have found out (we always do )and slapped a nice invoice on you.

I work as a maternity nanny and one of the agencies that i registered with have a clause that says if the parents donb't pay any fees due, they will chase the nanny for them.

I met a family through an agency and then a day later the mum asked one of her friends for a recommendation and was given my contact details. The mum asked me if we could "keep it quiet" and not tell the agency since she had also been given my details elsewhere. She said she was quite happy to write a ref after in a different name so that the agency wouldn't find out.

Obviously I told her there was no way I could do that to an agency. I am self employed and although I get alot of work from word of mouth and my website, I also get a fair amount from different agencies.

If you mess around with one agency, they will all blacklist you if you are caught. It just isn't worth it from the nannies point of view.

Only just saw that ppl were still posting on here!

Thanks for all the replies.

I was very impressed with the MN from the agency, much more so than the other 2 candidates so I am going to employ her through the agency to work for me.

I am just waiting till I am 12 weeks before I book her as I don't want to tempt fate.

Having said that, if I didn't leave in the back and beyond and there was lots of choice of highly qualified MNs available without using an agency, I think that would be my preference.

live not leave sorry!