where can you find great babysitters?

[HarietLowe]

I have two young children and need an occasional babysitter. I am wondering where to start looking for a safe reliable babysitter. Do you find them through agencies so you know they are properly qualified or do most people prefer family friends and people they know? I am not to sure about websites where babysitters can advertise themselves. What does everybody else do??

Try childcare.co.uk some advertise on there, have any of your friends got a teenager? At least you would know them then.

Do your dc go to nursery? We've always found babysitters among the staff there. However, now my youngest has started school we may begin to struggle!

Do you know anyone who works in a school with a sixth form who could recoomend someone to you?

Yep, try local nursery, especially if your DC go to one and are familiar with the staff.

Once they're at school, you might find parents with teenage children who might be able to help. Or indeed the parents of your DC's classmates themselves, once they become friends, will often be able to help you out in return for a bit of babysitting from you in return.

I'm using childcare.co.uk - relying on gut instinct about who to contact, followed up by meeting them.

I went onto childcare.co.uk, paid for a short membership and contacted as many people who were offering babysitting and I thought sounded good. I ended up with 1 fabulous babysitter who is a primary school teacher in a different village, but was also contacted by a few nannies whose week day hours were really far too long to be of any use for babysitting. Primary school teachers can be available far earlier than anyone else .

Also use the teenage daughter of someone who lives near me, and a young girl who lives just down the road whose name was in the list of babysitters in our Parish Magazine.

I have also found occasional care through < whispers> Netmums