Does anyone live in a rural area and have an au pair?

[peggyblackett]

How did you solve the transport issue?

I'm just about to get a quote for insuring a 23 year old on my clapped out Golf, however I have a feeling its going to be prohibitively expensive.

What did you do? Bite the bullet and pay? Or only advertise for older au pairs? I can't see how it would be fair to expect them to work in a village and not have transport.

I gave mine a bike. She cycles for the school run [20mins ish each way]. She often cycles to the train station [near the school]. If the weather is vile I have offered to cover the cost of a taxi as this works out cheaper than the insurance quote - which at over £1k was NEVER going to happen, to be honest she hasn't done this once in 6 months [even in the snow - they took a toboggan instead - her idea I promise!]

I made it very clear in the ad how far the nearest train station was and that I was not providing a car. I repeated this in my current ad for her replacement in 3 months and am still getting a huge amount of interest.

Thanks SVM.

I'd consider a bike, or even a moped, but I worry that they'd have to travel on the A road that runs through our village. OK, it does have a 50mph speed limit, but thats there for a reason - we have mahoussive lorries that drive along it. I think I would spend my whole time worrying. Gah. If we had a quiet lane route to town it would be much easier.

Maybe I need to leave it up to them, but just say no car.

I just do a fair amount of driving to and fro the bus stop 2.5 miles away. I have 3 teenagers of my own and just end up being "mum" to the au pairs as well. Which is why I'm relishing a few au pair-free months.

I have a 23yo au pair driving in town. Car insurance worked out as an additional £300 per year.

Lady- really? Wow! Our experience of adding au pairs is that it cost £35/week for a 21 yo for our 13 yo Corsa, or a whopping £1800/year.

I think that there is a huge difference in insuring a 21 year old and a 23 year old, and there is also a difference depending on how long they have had their licence.

£300 sounds promising. I could weep right now re. trying to find help. I'm advertising for a mothers help as an alternative option, and having no joy there. Either trying to find help in a rural area is hard, or we are just odd and scare people off with the first text/e-mail.

Duchesse, I don't mind being a taxi service took much - if that's what it takes then we'll need to do it.

I need cake.

Peggy - are you using au pair world? I seem to be getting a lot of good responses from there even though I explain that we are v. rural, and I'm sure we are much odder than you!

I found that the average au pair world candidate to be quite young though. But we're in suburbia so perhaps it is the older candidates who go for rural options.