I been looking after a little girl since she was 11 months old. Originally it was just a day here and a day there. Then, when she was 18 months old her hours were increased to 2.5 days. I had a baby in March and took 6 months off work. This little girl returned to me in September for 50 hours a week.
I never intended to childmind fulltime. I agreed with the mum that I would be paid for 45 hours a week, on the basis that some days she would be collected early. However, on looking at the timesheets, most days her parents arrive late. Sometimes as much as 40 minutes late, and usually half an hour late. I've worked it out that she is here around 53 hours a week and I'm being paid for 45.
However, its not really the money thats the problem. The problem is its wearing me out! I've got a 9 month old and 2 school age children. Some nights the baby will be up a lot and I can't catch up with my sleep during the day. The last 2 weeks I've felt headachy all the time and its because I'm so tired. The last 2 Saturdays I've ended up in bed. This is really starting to impact on my personal life.
Also, it would be nice to have some time with the baby. The collecting late is a big problem too. They are supposed to come at 5:30 but it can be as late as 6:20 before they arrive. By the time I get tea organised its time for the older 2 to go bed and so I'm not getting to spend much time with them. Sometimes I'm going out on a night and it has spoilt our plans on a couple of occasions. The first time they were full of apologies, but now they just do it. No warning, no sorry, they just turn up whenever they feel like it.
A couple of days ago I spoke to the mum and informed her that I would charge in future for all the hours her daughter is here. At first she wanted a reduction for the days she comes early (only ever by half an hour). I explained that if she gave me notice by the previous Friday I would be happy to do this. And I would as I would plan to do something nice with my family for that night. However, she apparantly has important things to do and cannot tell me until the day as she does not know what will happen. She's a midwife bytheway. I've worked for nurses before and they always get their off duty in advance and always managed to tell me their days off. Don't know why this mum can't.
But what has really upset me that I need to sort out is that she told me "I employ you". She didn't say it in a nasty way, more as a statement and this kind of makes sense with regards to her expectations. I think she's going totally unrealstic expectations of what she can expect from me. I think she thinks that I'm at her beck and call, just because she pays me £3 an hour.
She also told me that I have to work bank holidays as she sometimes works them and her husband cannot always get the time off. While I can see her problem, I do not want to work bank holidays as my husband does not work them and its our family time. She does not want me to take a holiday either. She needed 3 weeks off over xmas and in the summer and I agreed to take these times. However, I NEED more than this. I'm so tired and rundown, there is noway I can work from xmas until August without any time off.
Any ideas on how I should approach the mum. Whenever I say anything she tells me how she has things to do. There's no consideration that I may have things to do. And I think this comes back to her attitude of "I employ you".
End of rant and apologies for it being so long.
FL.