Advice on Nanny Maternity Leave!!

[copey]

Thinking of employing a nanny who has been hinting that she may well want to start a family in the near future. Although I don't have aproblem with her bringing baby on the job - so to speak- how would maternity pay work? Who pays it - I can't afford to pay both her and tempory child care - any advice greatly received!

Haven't experienced it myself but have been researching it as my nanny asked me to look into it.
On a standard nanny contract nannies are entitled to the standard maternity pay (think that's 90% of salary for 6 weeks, followed by £100 a week for another 18 weeks) - it seems that the employer pays it but can claim it back from the government - and is paid the money back, plus a small percentage extra for doing the admin...There's more about it on the nannytax website.
So you won't be out of pocket for two times the childcare cost..but you will have the hassle of finding a nanny to cover the mat. leave period.
It's quite poor mat. pay for the nanny (mine wouldn't be able to take more than 3 months off on that) - dh and I have agreed to put aside some money each week to use as a Maternity bonus if our nanny gets pg. (since it seems pretty likely!)

How much do you think a bonus should be ? Do you mind me asking?

Hi Copey, I have recently had a nanny go on maternity leave and it is a lot less hassle than you might think. First of all, the statutory minimum for pay (which, iirc is 6 weeks at 90 per cent and 20 weeks at £100 odd a week) is paid for by the inland revenue. They actually send you a girt big cheque for it all at once so you have to keep remninding yourself why your bank balance looks more healthy than it should! In addition they pay you a small sum - I think about £150-200 which is intended to cover incidental expenses you might incur in recruiting a replacement - you don't have to account for this they just dosh out a set sum to everyone. I think the most difficult thing will be if you need to find a short-term replacement. I was - kind of - fortunate in that it was clear from the beginning that my nanny wouldn't return to work - this meant I could hire a new person permanently (technically I suppose my nanny could have changed her mind but I knew, for various reasons, that it just wasn't going to happen). Having said that it's not too much hassle I ought to say that I use a pay-roll agency and they sort all this stuff out. If you can afford it it's well worth the money - when I first started I took one look at the forms and was stunned by the total incompetence with which they had been drawn up (eg "fill in form "102 Small Employees Starter Form" before filling in this form" ...so I request form "102 Small Employees Starter form". what arrives in the post? "form 102 medium employees confirmation form" Am quite serious. Is this stil form 102? or are there 2 102s? I gave up.

Thank you so much for your advice - that is a great help!!

I agree with Bluebear that it's really not very much. we too gave ours a kind of bonus - we gave it her all at once but was equivalent to an extra £40 a week. (still not much really) you have to keep in mind that maternity pay is liable to tax

Presumably though if a nanny goes on maternity leave, then she is effectively leaving her post, as if she brings her baby with her after the brth then in effect she is changing job. There's no legal obligation on the employer to have to permit the nanny to bring her baby to work with her. If the employer does go down this route then it should be under a new contract of employment I would have thought.

Not sure on the level of the bonus - our nanny has a baby already (which comes to work with her), and has said she wants another one in 2 years time, so we know we have plenty of time to start saving for a bonus now - so £10 a week would be about £1000 bonus if she works for us for 2 years and then has her second baby (haven't done the tax calculation), and if she leaves us before she gets pg we have some more savings..or if she gets pg sooner than expected she has less of a bonus.
It's not in her contract or anything, just something dh and I would like to do for her.

you're half right ladymuck. no there is no obligation for the employer to allow the nanny to bring the child to work and yes, if taht does happen it ought to be under a new contract. However the nanny can place her child in childcare and return to work like the rest of us. so they are not leaving work by going on maternity leave any more than anyone else.

Yes, but if they bring their baby to work (as seems to be the assumption in the OP) then the job has potentially changed. Agreed that obviously nannies can continue with the current job and leave their children in childcare - just I haven't met anyone who has done that yet... I would usually expect to be on fairly safe ground by hiring a new nanny for maternity leave with the expectation that they become permanent at the end of the maternity leave period.

I see what you mean. I do know of at least one nanny who puts her two in childcare to work. The problem is the nanny on maternity leave would then, essentially be resigning, and they would
actually only have to give you a month's notice to do that, and I assume they could do that 5 months into their maternity leave. I'm not at all sure but if you had hired a permanent replacement they would probably have a case for constructive dismissal. I've never heard of it coming to that. what a nightmare though. So glad mine was all worked out 100 per cent amicably.

misread your post - thought you said hiring them permanently from beginning. I think you are right. I do wonder if it's ever been tested though

You can claim all money back you pay- before hand and a little besides for your trouble, I was a nanny and then had a baby and boss did it all through nanny tax.
Goodluck!