Nanny resignation - warning signs?

[katharinehepburn]

We have had a nanny for nearly 4 years and have (up till now) thought we had a good working relationship.

However she has just handed in her notice for four weeks time.

She has found another job. Hourly pay rate similar but fewer hours. No changes in her personal circumstances to explain it. Nor in ours. All previous jobs she had stayed till the children were at least 8 yrs old.

I now have a distraught child (asleep at last) who thinks nanny doesn't like her or her brother anymore and I can't explain to them why this has happened because I don't understand it myself.

I guess what I wanted to know was, how common is it for nannies in a long term post (we will need a nanny for years to come) to suddenly decide to leave without even warning the parents that this was a possibility?

If she had told us she wanted to do less we could have actually worked it out quite easily. I know she is perfectly entitled to do this but to just do it without any warning leaves a bad taste in my mouth and an uncomfortable end to her employment with us.

Off to look at CVs now.....

Thanks to those who replied. Take on board the points about nannies having their lives made difficult by giving extra notice and will make sure I don't do this for the next three weeks. Kids ok, have said to them that nanny is meant to be a nanny to little children and they now need a big girl/boy nanny. They will miss her as will we but am pretty sure we'll keep in touch.

We have found a new nanny to start end July. She's lovely and although will have to pay her much higher hourly rate she'll be doing a lot fewer hours so will be saving nearly £4000 a year. Guess unexpected resignation has allowed us all to reevaluate what we need. New nanny has 8 week notice period in contract though!

Fully appreciate the bit about nanny1 giving the notice we had all agreed to though. Several glasses of wine over last few nights helped that one!

"New nanny has 8 week notice period in contract though"

Beware that if they leave earlier there is little you can do about it except mention it in a reference, but if you are giving 8 weeks notice to them then you will end up paying that if you want to get rid without a fuss, so in practice you may end up worse off with an extended notice period.

will have to pay her much higher hourly rate she'll be doing a lot fewer hours

I don't think it would have changed the original nanny's situation in this case (as it seems she wants to look after pre-schoolers), but it may have done. It's something parents really need to think about, especially when their children are coming of school age. Parents will often pay a new nanny a higher rate and have her for less hours, but wouldn't even consider it for an existing nanny - parents can be their own worst enemies sometimes.

I'm glad you have found someone so quickly - I hope it all transitions well for you and the children.