Contract for a part-time nanny

[tkband3]

We have found a new nanny who will be doing morning school runs and after school care in term time and full days in the holidays, 2 days a week. She has another nanny job on the other 3 days a week and a weekend job as well!

I am putting her contract together (a friend is nanny for an HR director and I am using her contract as a starting point) and have a couple of questions:

Is it ok to give her a probationary period? We had a rather awful experience with our first nanny and I wanted to give us (and our nanny) a simple way to cancel the contract in the first couple of months. I have suggested a period of 2 months, during which the notice period (on either side) will be a week, after which it will revert to one month.

Because she has 2 other jobs, she's going to be sorting out her own tax and NI payments. I've offered her the option of being paid monthly directly into her bank account or weekly in cash. What would be the standard practice for holiday/sick pay?

Thanks for your help.

Yes, probation period is fine.

No, you should operate full PAYE. Your nanny is your employee most likely.

Holiday entitlement I think will need to be calculated on an Hours basis, as hours worked during term time will be a lot less than during school holidays.

SSP is standard with regards to sickness. Then in reality you can be more generous if you so decide for any particular time sickness occurs.

Thanks very much for your help.

As Nick says, payment of tax and NI for employees through PAYE is the responsibility of the employer and CANNOT be shifted to the employee, and there is Employer's NI to pay too. Start here.

And although it is unlikely she would ever find out, have you checked that your friend's employer is happy for you to use her contract (which is probably a breach both of confidentiality and copyright).

Thanks for the input. I have contacted PAYE for nannies to set up the correct systems for paying our nanny. Re the contract, I had permission from both employer and employee to use it.

Thanks again.