What should i be paid as a nanny/child minder/ mothers help?

[Skifit]

I have been offered a job for a couple of days per week, from about 8.15am - 1pm. I havnt worked in this field for a while and the mother has never hired someone to mind her child before. I am not sure how much to ask for per hour. The mother i will work for has one little boy aged 20 months and another one due in June. She will be out during the hours I care for her son.
My work would be doing a few domestic chores and sole care of the little boy.
Assuming i am paid per hour....what should i request?

Depends entirely on your location, qualifications and experience even if you've not nannies for a while. Or do you mean not worked in childcare?

You would be a nanny, possibly nanny/housekeeper.

I suspect the parent will want to keep below the threshold for tax and NI (and therefore employers NI, even if this is a second job for you) but as you're doing around 10 hours a week that's unlikely to be a problem.

I havnt worked as a nanny/mothers help for many years. I have been a fitness instructor. I am a qualified Montessori nursery teacher though with 10 years experience as a nanny and have had my own children (3) two of which are now grown up. So many many years experience taking care of children.
Do you think £10 per hour is asking too much? At present the mother said she was paying 450 per month for little one at a day nursery and obviously wants to cut back on this expense.

by the way i am in Wiltshire, England.

£10 gross per hour is probably on the high side for Wiltshire however you do have qualifications and significant prior experience.

At that price you won't work out much cheaper than the nursery. 52 x 100 is £5.2k over a year, which works out at £435 a month.

Maybe I will suggest 10 per hour and see what she says.??

I would suggest you look carefully at HMRC: PAYE Basics, as depending on your circumstances and how much this job pays, your employer may need to operate PAYE and may not be aware of that. The NI LEL goes up as of 6th April 2011 (to £102 per week I think), so looking at www.mranchovy.com/calc/ if you work 10 hours a week at £10 gross per hour and your tax code is 746L then there is no Employee NI, no Employers NI, no Employee income tax.

So looks to me that £10 gross per hour for 10 hours of work would not mean your employer would need to operate PAYE... unless you have other income.

I don't know how old you are... don't want to offend but if you receive a Pension then that I believe is considered to be income. So I think that would affect how much you would be taxed in a job.

Not sure about state benefits, I think some are and some are not considered income. So if in receipt of any benefits, check how having a job would affect your benefits and if your employer pays below NI LEL would they need to operate PAYE or not.

With regard to the cost of having a nanny vs nursery - a nanny is usually MORE expensive. In your case I suspect that may still be the case, as salary wise alone you are looking at £100 a week and there are then additional costs involved such as admission costs for outings/activities, travel costs for outings/activities, cost of providing you with lunch (that may depend on if the contract provides for that or not), a small amount of cost for having lights/heat on at home during the day more than perhaps would be the case if no one was at home. If employer has to operate PAYE, then there are admin costs associated with that even if they do it all themselves - such as cost of phone call to a helpline, production of a payslip. If using a payroll agency, then that costs - varies, though I'd say £12-£13 per month is typical (there are cheaper and more expensive options).

Therefore if your potential future employer wants the costs to be lower than nursery... I think you will need to ask for a lower salary than £10 gross.

Once second child comes along, the cost of a nanny vs nursery gets better... as if say the nursery charges £450 per child... and you came in at £500 a month, then employing you would be cheaper.

So it's a numbers thing I feel... the more children there are, the more it costs for childcare if that childcare is charged on a per-child basis. Nannies don't cost on per-child basis, so become cheaper (vs a childcare provider who charges per child) the more children someone has.

Convenience is a factor - probably a lot easier for your potential employer to have a nanny, as then they don't need to be taking/fetching their child from nursery.

So thinking about that... if you were to want £10 gross per hour, then at first it would cost your employer more than nursery I think.... but once child no2 arrives, you would then be cheaper than nursery. So you need to sell it to the parent along those lines... as you are negotiating a salary for starting soon, plus probably the rest of the year and into 2012.