Nanny problems - sorry, really long!

[MotherBoss]

Namechanged as I don't want the nanny to look up my other posts, but would like some advice. Will try to be brief (but know it's not!!! Important bit after CURRENT SITUATION) but don't want to get accused of dripfeeding. Am intending on showing this to nanny so feel free to tell me if you think I'm being unreasonable.

I have had a part time nanny working for me for the past year, am a SAHM but trying to study at the same time. 3 conditions were placed on her employment, that as soon as practicable nanny was to complete her NVQ3, obtain her driver's licence and passport so that we could do short family trips abroad with the nanny.

At this point NVQ3 is unfinished. Partly nanny's fault and partly her supervisor. Last week the nanny told me the last of her work had been emailed. A few days later she let it slip that she still had to do them. No driving lessons undertaken as yet - I would only fund some lessons if I she funded some of her own, no lessons to date! Passport application only lodged after many, many reminders. Passport office had a number of questions and everytime she received a query in writing, she only responded when they chased up with a phone call after the letter went unanswered. She has only just now received her passport.

I live in a slightly rural location, and the location of DS1's nursery requires a driver to take him for his morning sessions. Possible to do the trip by bus, but the 2 trips would mean DS2 spends almost 3 hours a day in a pushchair to do it. Nanny not brilliant at cooking, but has made some effort to cook from some recipe books which we both chose together. Her organisational skills are also lacking, she doesn't plan things properly and gets caught out with jobs undone, because of frequent last minute 'situations', although she is getting better.

She does do extra duties, willingly cleans the house and washes our clothing. But although a big clean done in the morning, I am often faced with mess at the end of the day because maintaining the tidiness is too difficult, so I still have to clean up anyway. After discussions about this she is better, but with the nanny share it has gone down hill again. TBH I would prefer she do her 'nursery' duties properly rather than spend the time tidying up areas where the children don't need to be.

Nanny has now said she is worth far more than her current salary due to her experience. I have pointed out that TO ME she is not worth that because of lack of licence and organisational skills etc. To get her a payrise I instigated a nanny share after first checking with her if she was ok with it. Nanny share has not gone well. The longer hours required by the other family are leaving nanny tired and stressed. My DS2 has also been fairly constantly ill for the last 2 months which I know doesn't make it easy.

I have had a few run ins with her during this last month, she has started to become a bit too 'bossy' towards me, telling me what she thinks the children need and arguing the point with me if I disagree. The run ins with her have left me feeling a bit angry towards her. I admit this may well be colouring my view about her behaviour at the moment.

Now due to employment for me happening a lot sooner than I expected I need childcare which doesn't require me being around to drive all the time. It has been agreed with all parties that other family will hire her for 4 days, and we will hire her for 1 and use a childminder on the other days that I need childcare. This will happen in the next few weeks. She does get a payrise, but not as much as she would have with the nannyshare.

CURRENT SITUATION - nanny has suddenly got ill. For the other family the timing is really terrible, but they are being as understanding as they can be, more than I am actually. Nanny had Friday off ill, which for me was terrible timing, and she had been due to look after the boys for me on Saturday for extra money. Both days I had to drag my two boys around with me all day for unalterable commitments which utterly exhausted them (couldn't find other sitter, husband away, no family living nearby). She didn't make an emergency appointment at the GP, I suspect she wasn't pushy enough with them. She didn't see the emergency GP on Saturday even though she was still very ill. So she made an emergency appointment by phone on Monday morning for the afternoon, KNOWING that she would have the children with her (and has to go there by train). DS2 also got ill again and required a GP appointment, different surgery, so I had to take him and she had to leave early to make her GP appointment.

She cannot understand why I am upset with her - these things happen, people get sick (my history with her is that she has had quite a bit of time off sick, she has used all her 5 days sick leave and most of her AL has been used up with sick leave, scattered here and there throughout the year). I believe that this much time off is too much for a professional nanny but she cannot see that this is an issue - people get sick and everyone has to deal with it.

GP told her she needed to take a few days off. Yesterday she thought it was reasonable to offer to me to work Tuesday and Wednesday and take Thursday and Friday off and give herself a 4 day break. If she doesn't take time off then she risks pneumonia. Fair enough. But... she has a concert she wants to go to on Tuesday, and if she is working on Tuesday she will go to the concert that evening as well. If she doesn't work Tuesday (today) then she won't go to the concert. I pointed out to her that her priorities were way out of line, if she thought that while being so ill that she couldn't even properly honour her work commitments she could go to a concert, exhaust herself further and we would be all understanding about it. The other family's MB has a deadline this week which could help her secure the employment she wants (if she doesn't meet deadline, she will lose the opportunity of this job). According to the nanny she is doing us a 'favour' by coming in when the GP told her she shouldn't and we should be grateful. The reality is that she has no sick leave or AL which she can take so can't afford to not work the whole week.

As it turns out nanny has the flu, and seeing the GP earlier wouldn't have helped her anyway, but at the time she thought she had tonsillitis so 'believing' that the GP could help her she still didn't go as soon as she could. The reality isn't affected by not seeing the GP earlier, but she can't see why I view her not seeing the GP as a sign that she is not being proactive enough.

I can't seem to get through to her that she is lacking in professionalism towards this incredibly important job. Can any of you help me???? (Or an I being an overbearing, pushy MB???!!!)

She cleans the whole house every morning and does your washing! (in a part time position and -i assume- low wages as she was young).
Seems to me like you had a bargain.
What you have is not nannyshare.
You want to show her the thread. Is this the way you solve problems??

You are angry whith her for having a life and getting tired on her days off?? WTF?

You think she has an attidute? Hmm

Laquitar, I know it is a long post, but if you're going to criticise then read my posts properly first! She does not clean the whole house every morning. Some of the cleaning she does I have asked her not to do when it is done at the expense of the duties she SHOULD be doing, ie the nursery duties. She faffs around cleaning the dining room which she doesn't need to touch and ignores the DC's bedroom and bathroom for the week. She does duties that I have NOT asked her to do, and doesn't do the ones she HAS been asked to do. (Not like she spends hours cooking meals either as she only manages to do about 1 meal from scratch a week, the rest need to be either prepared by me or are sandwiches, etc.) I do the nursery runs for my DC1, and she has plenty of time to do jobs while DC2 is napping during the day. I also take both DC out for activities during the week, leaving her plenty of uninterrupted time in the house to get things done and herself organised.

Washing comprises of putting a prepared basket into the washing machine and taking it out when it is done and popping it into the dryer. Gee, such a hard task. But (and granted I have not said this before so you wouldn't know) it is not something that can be done in the evening as the machine is directly under DC2s bed and disrupts his sleep. So machine can ONLY be used while he is awake. The majority of the washing is the DCs anyway, so she would come under nursery duties.

(As an EG, she can't abide bits of paper on the counter and will endlessly tidy them, but won't mop the floor because she runs out of time.)

Part time is 4 days, so the major portion of the week.

Nanny share started 1 month ago, so fairly recent, and was done to give her a payrise. Nursery duties were hardly done at all during this time because she was so tired. I expected fewer duties, yes, but not to the extent that occurred. That is why we've put an end to it.

If she wants a life on her days off, then fine. But if the life on her days off negatively impacts on her ability to do the job that I pay her for then yes, I do have the right to have an opinion on it. Going to a concert when your GP has told you that you risk pneumonia if you don't rest is hardly sensible and I can't see ANY employer being impressed with that sort of behaviour. Missing appointments on days off and then having to take time off from work for the appointment when rescheduled - appropriate? Hardly!

• 'but although a big clean done in the morning..'

This is what you wrote and what i comment on

• 'I have had a part time nany'. Your words.

Yes, i have read your post first

My first thought when I read this is that you're a quite harsh employer. This person has the 'flu, possibly tonsilitis and is risking pneumonia by working and you're far, far, far more concerned about her waiting 48 hours before seeing the doctor and thereby causing you some inconvenience...

Having a Nanny is not like sending the kids to nursery, you have to accept that sometimes your childcare will 'fail' and that you have to pick up the tab in terms of inconvenience/additional cost.

My second thought is that I am fairly sure you're breaking the law by knowingly allowing (or requiring) her to use holiday for sick leave. Holiday time is for R&R! No wonder she's stressed, ill and over-tired.

Maybe take a step back from this and consider how you'd want to be treated if you were in her position?

If you have decided you don't like or trust her and you could not get past this, then give her notice.

I really wouldn't show her this thread, MB. Wouldn't you be breaking confidentiality by discussing her shortcomings on a public forum? I know you haven't named her but even so ...

OK, fair point, I can see how it could read. But my first draft was so long that I cut out a lot of what I put in there.

She does a general clean of the kitchen area after breakfast which I have prepared and is either finished or almost finished when she arrives. So the big clean is breakfast dishes, and the toys and play things which she did not tidy up the previous day. It also can include unloading the dishwasher if I have run a fresh load that morning, and obviously loading it up with the day's dishes, and swapping the load of wash which I have set going with a fresh load. I have asked that we do at least 3 loads a day. That will usually be one of us doing 2 loads and the other doing 1 load. (I have actually had to tell her NOT to do constant washing through the day as that it wasn't part of her duties. When she first started she seemed to view any dirty laundry in the utility room as some sort of an offence/challenge and would frantically try to work her way through the whole load.) It would also occasionally involve some hoovering downstairs, as we get a lot of dirty/leaves coming through the house during the day with the DC.

For her the cleaning also involves putting away everything SHE thinks should be put away. A big bug bear of mine. I like things clean, but don't mind a little bit of untidiness, a few things out. She's the opposite, everything has to be put away, but not really 'cleaned'. I would prefer the floor mopped after the DC have dropped their food rather than my papers bundled up and tucked out of site. I will sometimes ask her to iron DH's shirts, but when she does that she generally doesn't do the DCs ironing. So these are the 'big' cleans that I'm talking about.

Yes it may be more than what a normal nanny does, but I do nursery runs and take the DC out for activities 2 afternoons a week so she has quite a bit of DC free time. More than most nannies of young DC I think.

I was upset that she waited 72 hours to see the GP. A round trip to her GP from our house by public transport takes 1 1/2 hours. From her home it is a 5 minute walk. Hardly common sense to wait until you are at work to make an appointment when you could have made one from home. Also, if you think you have an illness that would respond promptly to medicine, then I think it would make more sense to see the GP quickly, rather than waiting the 72 hours. Unreasonable of me? Maybe. What do others think?

I don't object to her having a life outside of work. I object when that life outside of work leaves her so exhausted during the week that she can barely function. I also object to being told that she risks pneumonia if she works, but that she still wants to go out to a concert. If she needed the time off then fair enough. But SHE offered to come into work and then go out to the concert afterwards. I didn't ask her to come into work. In fact I am not seeing her at all for the rest of the week, and if she does any work it will only be for the other family as that will only require looking after 1 child so will be easier for her while she is unwell.

I pointed out to her that her priorities were way out of line, if she thought that while being so ill that she couldn't even properly honour her work commitments she could go to a concert, exhaust herself further and we would be all understanding about it. Wanting to go out to a concert after being warned by her GP that she was so ill is what upset me.

Sick leave - I would quite happily not pay for her occasional days off sick leave. I certainly can't fund 20 days sick leave for a year, which is roughly how many days she took off either because she was ill or she needed time to get her strength back up. SHE asked to take them as annual leave because she couldn't afford for them to be unpaid.

I feel this many days off sick in a year is a lot. I feel it is incompatable with being a nanny. Do you disagree? I know illnesses happen, I have been quite flexible with her up until now. In my mind this much sick leave requires a reassessment on whether you are suited to be a nanny. She doesn't feel the same way which is why I wanted the opinion of others on this board.

(As an aside, I did suggest to her previously that she should think about getting a flu shot if she was so susceptible to catching illnesses from the children, she said she would ask her GP about it and as far as I know did nothing else about it.)

You need to find yourself another nanny plain and simple.

She does not meet your requirements and it also sounds to me like she is unhappy (for whatever reason). A proffessional nanny would always put the children first then nursery duties, anything else would come if she had time.

I'm a bit annoyed reading your comments on her illness though. Agree with you she should have taken the chance to see the gp earlier, but, as far as time off is concerned, your post comes across to me as you being inconvenienced too often???? I've gone for years with just the odd sniffle and sods law I took really ill once and had to take time off, MB (previous job) was bloody furious and pointed out that my references had told her I never took time off sick, well yes because I never needed too.

To the poster who said why take on someone who didn't meet your requirements? My current job did just that (except I was already a driver) and I had fulfilled all the requirements within 3 months. It can be done.

Doozle, you're probably right. But I just don't know how else to get through to her. I will probably just 'appropriate' some people's feedback here and use it in a discussion with her.

magicOC - of course I don't like being inconvenienced too often, does anybody? But I wasn't bloody furious about it, more mildly annoyed. Illnesses happen, but it is her lack of proactivity that really upsets me. Taking time off for an urgent GP appointment - fine (or taking the DC with you, have said I'm happy for that to happen but not if it is several times in a week). But not if it is because you slept through the appointment you scheduled on a day off. (Yes, that did happen!). Finding out you have a food intolerance to wheat and then when you feel better having toast for breakfast, sandwich for lunch and pasta for dinner and then feeling unwell again - hello????!!! (Aughh.. now I'm drip feeding, sorry!)

Do you really think she is unhappy? I just assumed that she has certain jobs that she prefers doing and so just avoids the other jobs if she can! I guess it could be unhappiness but I certainly didn't think she was unhappy the whole time she was here (she probably is now though, sadly).

I think it is time you started looking for another nanny. A nanny is meant to look after the children and hopefully make the parents lives better and easier, not to need baby sitting and reminding about every little thing.

Oh and for those who have said I need to find another nanny - TBH I have been put off now. I have found a childminder who I think is really nice and think it will be better to have the childcare off my premises for awhile. At least then the house will be in the same state when I come home as it is when I leave!

I wanted to keep the nanny 1 day a week simply because of her attachment to them and their attachment to her. I can't honestly see it lasting for very long though.

Keeping her because they are attached to each other is pointless really as she will have to go at some point.

I think I remember when you first posted about taking on a nursery worker as your nanny and I think I said at the time I didn't think it was a great idea. Sorry it hasn't worked out.

MB - From a nanny's POV Yes I do think she is unhappy, either that she is in the wrong line of work, there are too many little things which are being blown out of proportion (don't blame you though as it seems constant from your list).

Why not have a child free chat with her, iron out a few things, ask her how she feels, what's going on with driving etc and take it from there, but, seriously I think it's time to let her go.

There are great nannies out there MB, don't let her put you off.

Magic - we did have that chat. That was what led to me going for a childminder. I thought it went well, now this has all blown up!

I won't have the ability to be as flexible anymore as I was. I made it quite clear to her. I don't have the same ability to have last minute back up childcare as other people do. No family around, DH works ridiculously long hours, fairly new to where I live so don't have the built up friendships.

I know there are great nannies out there, I see them on this board!!!!!! Right now I just don't trust myself to spot one!

Glad you have found other childcare aka a cm

Fwiw I think you sound fair and have tried to make this work but you have had enough

Nanny seems a tad silly to find out she has a wheat intolerance and then eat toast/pasta etc

On many other threads people have said use annual holiday if nanny is ill or as a snow day - is this not legal?

I don't know if it's legal, but I thought it was extremely generous of me to allow it each and every time and am a bit at being criticised for it!

I think you have been very generous given the circumstances (20 days of random sickness would annoy me unless she was taking steps to build herself up, not leaving early for a concert). If you are at fault, it is that you let the situation drift for too long and have lost objectivity.

I would be letting this nanny go. Interestingly what reference did you give the new nanny share family?

Pretty much the truth - they had already met her several times and she had babysat for them, but paying more attention to the positives than the negatives. They know she will need more managing than the average nanny. While it was a nanny share it was predominantly at my house anyway so I had to do the managing.

Now it is a 'shared' nanny, they will have to manage on their own on their days. A lot of the issues I have I genuinly don't believe they will have. The nanny won't have the familiarity which has led her to be 'bossy' with me. I have seen her be far more circumspect with them (a little annoying for me that she can't do the same here!). They also won't be in the house during the day as I was, and they only have 1 younger child, so the messiness isn't an issue - 3 1/2 year olds are rather good mess makers!

Also, as you have pointed out, they have some 'objectivity' and are coming to it freshly without the previous baggage that the nanny and I have.

I sat down with her and discussed what I felt she needed to use this time in the new position to work on - concentrate on learning to cook more meals, she has that time with a child napping twice a day, make plans and manage her day based on those plans - not just see how the day works out (ie if she is delayed at a playgroups she doesn't have time to cook a meal, instead she needs to prepare a meal in advance so that running late doesn't mean that she hasn't the time to prepare the meal, etc), to focus on driving lessons (a regional nanny agency refused to put her on their books because she didn't have a driver's licence which was a good wake up call for her), and to use this slower paced job to get her strength back up and address her health issues.

She doesn't meet the criteria of her employment (driving and NVQ) despite being incentivised to do so.

She procrastinates which results in poor time management and disorganisation.

She cherry picks her duties.

She has an unacceptably high amount of sickness (20 days in 8 months? WTF?).

She argues with you about your children's care.

She has to go.