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Paid childcare

Discuss everything related to paid childcare here, including childminders, nannies, nurseries and au pairs.

How do I employ a nanny?

5 replies

catchafallingstar · 05/02/2012 23:28

Starting uni in August (PGDE) and am starting to look at my childcare options.
I am a childminder myself and had always thought I would go down that route but it is very difficult to find one with space for two after school children and I don't want them split up (P1 and P3).

It also seems that by looking at childcare.co.uk website, for nannies in our area, it may be cheaper than a childminder! It is appealing to me more and more because the dc will be at home and will help to minimise the various changes that will be happening this year (I have been a SAHM for 4 years and as I said will be going back to uni to train as a teacher. DS also starts school the day after I start my course!)
Because they will be at school most of the day I only need a nanny from 3-6, 5 days a week. Would I have to pay for the whole day?

Can anyone advise me how to go about emplying a nanny (live out) for after school hours only? Are there any good agenices I can look at (Scotland).

I am totally clueless with regards contracts and being an employer! DH wants to know if they would accept childcare vouchers!

Any help/advice much appreciated!

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Fraktal · 06/02/2012 07:11

I think that in Scotland if your nanny comes through an approved agency you can use vouchers.

After school nannies do exist although you can expect to pay a slight premium making them a bit more expensive per hour.

Would you/DH be able to do drop offs in the morning and guarantee being home by 6?

If you have space for someone live in could you consider an au pair? It sounds quite a classic au pair job. The downside is you then can't pay with vouchers so it may in fact be less economical.

Contracts you can either use a PAYE agency who will take care of payslips too, or if you plan to DIY there are sample contracts on Nannyjob - I would recommend the second contract with some modifications (gross salary, 5.6 weeks holiday, clearer dismissal section) and guidance on what as a minimum should be in there can be found on directgov (apologies for mobile link) who also have a nifty interactive tool.

bbcessex · 06/02/2012 08:31

Hiya, i have an after school nanny. Am in England.. If nanny is Ofsted registered you can pay with childcare vouchers, dont kmow if its diff for Scotland tho.

Www.childcare.co.uk is a good place to start looking.

bbcessex · 06/02/2012 08:35

Ps. You dont pay for rhe whole day, only the hours you contract to. Eg 3 till 6, 5 days per week, = 15 hours per week.
No idea of rates in Scotland, but £10 per hour gross might be a good budgeting start.

nannynick · 06/02/2012 19:27

Scotland is different to England in respect of childcare registration, in particular home childcarers (nannies).

Starting from the last question in your post, to use Childcare Vouchers you need to hire the nanny via a registered agency.

This mumsnet post from 2009 has some discussion about fees involved - one off fee is mentioned, a monthly fee is mentioned.

The agency must be registered with SCSWIS - Find a Child Care Agency (if the type of service box is not showing Child Care Agency, select that from the dropdown list.) Enter in your postcode and select a mileage, say 50 miles then narrow it down a bit from there if you have several agencies in your area.
Looking at the list I got from a test search, not all seem to be Nanny Agencies. Some offer Sitter services, Mobile Creche, Temporary staff to Nurseries. So I would suggest you get an initial list of agencies then look up on their websites, or call them, to find out if they provide nannies. Then talk to them about the fees involved, including if say you were to find a nanny yourself could they then put that nanny through the agency for childcare voucher purposes.

Childcare.co.uk shows a figure that the individual nanny has entered into the system. That figure may or may not be for nannying work, it may be for evening babysitting. You also don't know for sure if the figure is Gross (before tax deductions), or Net (after taxation deductions). So I would suggest you treat the figure as an indication but to be aware that until you contact them and discuss the childcare you actually need, the salary you would need to offer that candidate may differ from the figure on the website. The figure given may also be for all-day care... so contracting to say 50 hours a week, not for part-time care.

As the employer you will decide what salary you will be paying someone to do the job. So now you have a rough idea of what people in your area may be expecting to be paid, calculate what you are actually able to afford to pay and what you expect them to do for that salary. Try to keep in mind as many of the costs involved as possible, for example... if a nanny is collecting children from school - how are they going to do that? Their own car? If so, then there will be mileage payments to take into account. HMRC: Approved Mileage Rates

Look at the cost of employing someone, such how much Employers NI would be paid by you, on top of the nannies Gross salary? Use the excellent PAYE (2012/13 tax year) calculator by MrAnchovy. That calculator will also do Net to Gross calculation, though you will need to know the nannies tax code. Use code BR to see the worst case situation - code BR will represent all income being taxed, instead of taking account of personal tax allowance.

DS also starts school the day after I start my course!)

So what happens on the day you start your course? DS would need fulltime care, not 3pm-6pm. Same problem will occur on any days that school for whatever reason is closed, yet you are at college or on placement (do you do placements as part of PGCE?). What about school holidays - you may or may not have the same holidays as your children. What about minor child illness - school does not want them to attend but they are not really that sick, so can you justify missing college?

Think about what backup childcare you have available, as if you hire a nanny for after-school care only, then that nanny may or may not be available to do all day care when it's needed.

Read lots of this section of Mumsnet. There have been quite a lot of discussion over the years about things like Contracts, managing an employee, examples of what nannies do during their working day and what some nannies won't do.

You can use Mumsnet Advanced Search to limit a keyword search to this specific part of Mumsnet Talk (select Choose Topics, then from the list that appears, select "Childminders, Nannies, Au-Pairs etc" in the left column and click the purple > button to move that to the right column. Then click Save Favourites. Check that you have a keyword (or words) entered in the box below where it says "include the words:" and click on the purple Search button near the bottom of that form. Sounds complex but it's easy once you get used to it. Smile

catchafallingstar · 07/02/2012 21:32

thank you all!

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