Nanny shares

[FromThePeg]

Can anyone advise me on a fair way to pay for a nanny share? We are considering a nanny share with another family. We will require 5 days/ week for one child. They need three, and sometimes four days, but have two children.

There are a lot of ways to split this, of which there are probably two extremes(based on 4 days):

1. there's a total of 9 days, of which we have 5 and they have 4, so we pay 5/9 of the total
2. there are 13 "child-days" in each week, of which we have 5 and they have 8 (2 children x 4 days each), so we pay 5/13 of the total

We are actually fine with paying 50%. The other family seems a bit less so. What do people here think is fair to both of us?

Thanks for your help!

Whose house would be used? That may make a difference.

Well, a nanny generally wont charge more if a family has one or two children - so I think 'child days' is the least fair way.

I think they pay 4/9 and you pay 5/9 is the most reasonable option - but they pay 4 whether they use 3 or 4 days.

This is only the beginning of the negotiation that is 'nanny share' :)

We'd probably use my house most of the time.

We've been thinking of doing a nanny share too as it doesn't work out that much more than the local nursery. I'm talking with friends that live near us as they have a small boy only a month older and so could work out really well.

Is that right that nanny's don't charge more if there is more than one child? Everything I've read on the subject says there is an additional charge / premium for more than one child / family (and if I was a nanny I'd certainly want more - it's more work!). There don't really seem to be any standards and everything is an individual negotiation as far as I can see - the only guidelines seem to be that a nanny's pay-rate will increase with experience, the number of children and if you are offering fewer hours as ultimately the nanny needs a reliable salary.

McGeachyBoggin - Yes, when they are working for just one family a nanny will care for all the children in that family. A new baby comes along, does not mean the nannies salary goes up, in the same way that when a child goes to school it does not mean the salary goes down.

For more than one family - so a nannyshare - then yes, I feel the salary is a bit higher, as the nanny is having to juggle the requirements of two sets of bosses, co-ordinate holidays that sort of thing. So in a nannyshare I feel the nanny will be on a higher wage than if they were just working for one family... but it's not the number of children that causes that to happen but the additional issues created by having multiple bosses, multiple places of work.

Nannies salaries can vary widely at times, though do seem to me to typically hang around the £8-£12 per hour mark in general... with things like experience and location affecting things, more than say number of children.

As with most jobs, it is down to negotiation. Parents can only offer to pay a nanny what they can afford to pay. The nanny then needs to decide if they will accept that salary or not. Nannies are just like other humans, they have bills to pay, so they can't accept a job which doesn't pay enough.

FromThePeg - You will get some benefits from having a nanny working at your home. However you will also get some negatives. Perhaps list the Pros and Cons so that you are able to apply some value to that. Example Pro - nanny can do your children's laundry, make your children's beds. Example Con - you have more equipment at your home, such as multiple highchairs.