Contract for a school holidays nanny

[WindyAnna]

Hi all

Just wondering if anyone can help with a contract for a nanny who is only covering school holidays?

It's my current nanny and she has chosen to reduce to these times, it's fine by me as my DD is at full time school and there is excellent before and after school care. She's a great nanny and very much part of the family and I don't want to change so it makes sense for all of us.

Holidays ... At the moment her contract states she gets 20 days holiday plus bank holidays. I know I should pro-rata the 28 days against the days she will work but I'm not sure whether to do it on the 20 days or include the bank holidays? Also at the moment her contract states that she should take half of her holidays to coincide with ours but given she will be working the school holidays the last thing I want is for her to schedule her holidays different from ours so can I dictate that she must have her holidays at the same time as we do? Also if I include the bank holidays in the allowance does that mean if there are more bank hols than she is entitled to during the holidays then she has to use her remaining holiday allowance to cover it?

Employment ... I will pay her tax and NI for the weeks she works but will her employment still be considered to be continuous? Would it be better to average it out as a monthly salary? Would that work out better for her?

Anything else I should be considering?

Thanks

Windy

I think it is rather complex, so not sure if I will get this right.

Holidays - you can dictate when all holidays occur, so that isn't a problem. However you may end up wanting them to not work on more occasions than they have statutory entitlement to take off (see below about how many days entitlement they might get, plus the number of bank/public holidays).

How many weeks (and thus hours) would your nanny be working a year?

Lets say a nanny works 10 hours a day, 5 days a week thus 50 hours a week and works 16 weeks a year.
16 weeks x 50 hours = 800 hours
800 hours x 12.07% = 96.56 hours
96.56 hours / 10 = 9.66 days
Round that up to give 10 days.

The 12.07% is the leave entitlement that accrues as a worker works. See Casual Workers

With regard to Bank Holidays quite a few do occur during school holidays, such as Boxing Day, New Years Day, Good Friday, Easter Monday, depending on when half term falls Spring Bank Holiday and Diamond Jubilee, Summer Bank Holiday. See: Bank Holidays

Do you need them to work any of these dates? Do you want to insist that they take them as part of annual leave (could well use up most of their entitlement), or are you in a position to let them have the day off on full pay?

Also if I include the bank holidays in the allowance does that mean if there are more bank hols than she is entitled to during the holidays then she has to use her remaining holiday allowance to cover it?

I don't get what you mean by that. If you include the bank holidays in the allowance then I think they may only have 3 or perhaps 4 days remaining. If you then go away during the Summer Holiday, then I would guess that you would go away for those remaining 4 days, though probably for longer.
If you choose to not need them on days which are during the school holiday periods, then I feel that if they don't have sufficient holiday that can be taken you will need to pay them as if they were working. You are making the decision to not need them, not them choosing to take holiday.

I will pay her tax and NI for the weeks she works but will her employment still be considered to be continuous? Would it be better to average it out as a monthly salary? Would that work out better for her?

No idea on that one I'm afraid. You should get advise about if it is continuous or not, plus also about taxation side of things.

What if your nanny wants to leave... if you are paying them a set amount each month and they leave before the Summer holidays, then they may well have been overpaid, as the bulk of the work is during the summer.

Thanks Nick.

At the moment we seem to end up paying nanny for days we take off that she doesn't - I have no problem with this - our choice to take more time off, not her fault. I suspect this would be even more likely when she is school holidays only as we'll take 2 weeks in summer, at least a week at Christmas and probably another week somewhere .... she will be entitled to about 2 weeks leave but will still effectively get 4 weeks - lucky woman! I know there are people who employ nannies who would not pay them for the extra 2 weeks, I think that it at least immoral and at most illegal so I would always pay!! I have in the past asked nanny to come in and sort out child related tasks when we are away (sort out toy cupboard, catch up or ironing etc.) but that is never enough to fill the time so would still get time off. I actually think she will get the same amount of paid time off as she gets full time, not sure how I feel about that TBH but I don't think there is a fair way to avoid it.

Re the bank holidays you had already answered in in your precious point - thanks!

I will get advice on continuity of employment - I know she had quite a few months off previously where I did not pay her and as neither of us ended the contract it was considered continuous so I assume the same but will check. Taxation wise it is easy as I am her only employer. NI wise I have a feeling she may need to make up her contributions to make it continuous ... I think previously she got SSP which covered it, obviously that won't be the case this time. Good point regarding her leaving, although it's unlikely it is still possible!

Thanks for your help! I haven't found anyone who employs a holidays only nanny to give me advice - the only people who seem to do something similar do some dodgy (well it sounds dodgy to me) way of calling them a "babysitter" and not employing them.

Thanks again

Annette

Keep in mind that you may not always be her only employer. So any wage things must be negotiated as Gross, so changes to tax coding does not affect you as the employer too much (if at all).

A nanny always has to leave at some point, they can't be your nanny forever.

Why does it matter if it is continuous employment or not?

Continuity of employment is important for calculating length of service for things like redundancy and maternity leave.

This is a grey area, but in these circumstances the employee is most likely to be in continuous employment with the employer as there is a single ongoing contract and the mutual obligation to work/provide work during the holidays persists during term time.

For the avoidance of doubt, it would be best practice to state that employment is continuous in the contract.

Payment of a fixed amount monthly will work out better for both of you from a National Insurance point of view, but may cause problems if she is claiming benefits when she is not working so discuss this after.

If I were you I would arrange family holidays at the beginning or end of school holidays so she doesn't have her work period interrupted and you won't then have to pay her for two weeks you don't need her. Then work out how many days she will work in the year, add on 12.07% and round up to the nearest day. Multiply that by the daily rate and make that the annual salary. Set out in the contract the dates she needs to work for the coming year and the dates she will have paid holiday (just add these on to the end of the summer holiday).

Brilliant - thanks!