Not sure what to think about this....

[HeadFairy]

I started work early this morning so left before our nanny came. Dh left once she'd arrived. He got half way down the road when he remembered he'd left a vital document at home so went back to get it. As he arrived he saw our nanny taking her dd (whom she brings to work with her) and wearing her coat and carrying her bag back to her car. Dh said she looked "sheepish" and said she was looking for her phone as she couldnt' find it. She apparently went back in to the house, left her dd and her bag and then went back out to her car to look for her phone. Dh says the front door was double locked and he's convinced she was going to drive back to her house (5 mins away by car) to look for her phone leaving our kids alone at home (they're 5.11 and 3.7).

I can't stop thinking about it. How on earth do I get to the bottom of what she was doing? If she was just popping out to her car to search her car why did she have her coat on, was carrying her dd and had her bag with her, and why was the front door double locked? If I ask her outright if she was going to leave my children alone in the house she will deny it.

Of course, nothing actually happened, does it matter that it appears the intent was there?

I don't want to drip feed so I will mention she's had form for this sort of thing in the past and I gave her a warning it must never happen again. Last time it wasn't malicious in the slightest, just poor judgment.

I'm guessing he didn't realse the implication of what he was seeing until too late

that was really blunt - sorry - i know she is innocent until proven guilty so you have no reason to sack her other than gut instinct - its just you're very defensive of her.

Charleymouse She texted me to say her phone had a battery problem and had been off all morning (I'd sent her a couple of texts before I knew about this situation, ds was going on a play date this morning and I sent her the address)

nannyowl yes, if the car is in sight of the house I will pop out to get things occasionally.
The younger two do occasionally bicker, but nothing serious.

belugagrad Thank you for your bluntness :) My reluctance is nothing to do with what we pay her, we do pay her slightly less than the going rate because she brings her dd with her to work, that was her suggestion. When I was interviewing her I didnt' even mention money, she was always the standout person in terms of how she related to the children. Her rapport with them was by far and away the most relaxed, natural and fun. We did two interviews, and in the process of those two interviews she came across fabulously. She's been with us for 2 years, her dd and my dd are incredibly close. Like sisters really. My ds adores her, I really don't want to take any hasty action if I'm wrong.

You're never going to know what her plan was this morning so you have to go with your gut on this one.

For me its a no brainer, you'll forgive yourself if it ends your childs friendship and you'll forgive yourself if sacking her turns out to be the wrong decision (you might be annoyed at yourself and me and others on this thread though). You won't forgive yourself if something terrible happened in the future.

OP you need to have a chat with her tonight. Ask her outright, were you going to drive home? Maybe she was only popping to the car to look in it. If she knows you occasionally leave the children to get bits out of the car this would be reasonable; as long as the house if safe, no open fires, oven on etc. Not ideal obviously.
If you are happy with her in other ways then maybe you could arrange for your mum to pop around, leave work early yourself on a few occasions. But your children would probably tell you if she did anything very different to you.

I'm going to see what ds says.... if he says anything that makes me more suspicious then I will ask to see her over the weekend and talk to her properly about it.

I do shifts that I can only leave if I'm physically ill or there is an emergency. Unfortunately as it's a 3 hour round trip I can't pop home to check on her. I'm going to speak to my mum now and see what she thinks...

Is your DH a reliable witness? Is he prone to thinking the worst/adding additional details to what he's seen? Does he like the nanny?

it doesnt sound good tbh - why take her own child and leave yours? why double lock the door/have coat/bag

i rem the shop incident as well :(

i think you need to ask her face to face and judge her reaction

if she does say erm yes i was going to pop home, will you sack her? coz to me thats neglect and sackable

I'd say it all depends on where the car was really.

If it was 20 yards away down the street, out of sight of the house, then I can believe that she might have come into your house, and before she'd taken her coat off realised she didn't have her phone. She'd pick up her bag to see if it was in there and then think she might have left it in the car. Your two are happily watching telly in their own familiar living room and she thinks she can safely pop out for a minute. Her DD, on the other hand does not live there, is not settled into an activity and is never in your house without her. She therefore takes the DD with her. She double locks the door out of force of habit.

BUT BUT BUT

If it was right outside the house or on the drive, then it looks a lot more dodgy.

Also, I would trust your DH's instinct.

In fact when I read it I thought - why wouldn't she pick her phone up from her house a bit later in the day when they are going somewhere, on the way to the playdate for instance? I wondered whether she actually had, say, a Drs appointment with her DD.

The other big red flag is the leaving a 4 year old in a shop. It's not an "error of judgement." You just don't do that! Even a 10 year old sibling would know you don't leave a pre-schooler on their own in a shop while you go off to do something for yourself. And this is not a sibling, it is someone PAID to look after your child and keep them safe. You paid her to look after your child that day and she took your money and left him in a shop while she went on a personal errand. "Poor judgement" and "mortified" my spectacularly cellulitey arse. She was mortified you found out and she got into trouble more like.

Agree with Blonds and Ballonslayer the shop incident is a massive red flag. Completely abnormal thing to do.
Has she got any childcare training? I would think she hasn't. Does she have up to date first aid? Public liability insurance? Does her car insurance cover her to drive with your children in the car. If she hasn't let her insurance company know; then she will not be covered for transporting your children because she is working as a nanny.
Sorry OP a lot to think about and not something you can deal with at work. I am sure your children are safe today. But all needs sorting asp.
You could take carers unpaid leave to sort out next week.

Surely she would ONLY take her handbag if she was going somewhere? I would only ever take keys if I was popping to the car to get something, and if it was parked far enough away from the house that I felt the need to double lock I would always take the children. If it was someone else's children I was responsible for then I would never leave them alone even for a couple of minutes just in case.
I know how hard it is when you're at work and have to trust the person in charge but these two incidents are massive warning signs to me that she is not capable of making very, very obvious decisions about safety. I would not expect anyone in charge of small children to ever think this was ok.
These will definitely not be the only incidents, they are just the two you have found out about. Massive sympathy OP very stressful. But you need to get someone else.

She is capable of making judgement calls about safety though. She applies them to her daughter

Swishyswashy maybe the car was parked outside the house; but as it is a busy road the nanny double locked the door so the children would not run out. The OP has said she does occasionally leave the children if she is getting something out of the car.
Agree if not just outside the house she should have taken them with her.
But yes you are right why did she have her handbag? This does seem to indicate she was going to drive off.
I think swishyswashy is right OP very difficult but get someone else.

I think the shop incident was possibly explained by a cultural difference? The nanny is eastern European and I think some posters said it is more commonplace to assume a child playing in a toy shop is ok to be left for five minutes while you pop to another shop? I could be misremembering though....

Maybe she had left her phone in her car, not taken her coat off yet, taken her dd with her because she was clingy, shut the door so that OP's dc couldn't leave the house what with the car being along the road or even round the corner...

But - the door was double locked. The yale lock would have been sufficient to keep the children indoors, but she took the time to double lock it.

Sorry, OP; I think your dh's instincts, and yours, are correct.

^I want to give her the benefit of the doubt, maybe her dd was being clingy and she couldn't even go out the front door without her yelling, maybe she took her bag with her because her car keys were in her bag and she just grabbed it, maybe she double locked the front door because ds can open the door if it's just on the Yale lock, maybe she had her jacket on because she was chilly (it was 8.30).....
^

All seems fairly feasible to me.

Wait and see what DS says when DH talks to him then see what your DH's gut feeling says.

You have plenty of time now to think about what you are going to do.

luckylou - but the OP says that her DS can open the door if the yale lock is on. If the nanny was doing what she said she was doing, but had left the door only with the yale lock on and the OP's DS had got out, then she would have been in the wrong as well... other than dragging all three kids to the car to get her phone, she really couldn't do anything else.

Really Chipping? (genuine question not snarky). Because if I saw someone walking to their car with their coat, bag and toddler, having locked the door behind them I'd be 99% sure they were about to drive off.
Could be wrong - and it's interesting to see that other people feel there is more room for doubt.

I've spoken to my mum, the children are at the fair this afternoon, but she will go round for their tea time and just hang around pretending she hasn't seen them for a while and see how things look. Her feeling is we have to see what ds says, whether the nanny had said she was going out for five minutes. If she did then we'll call her in over the weekend, hear her story and if we think she's lying we'll have to ask her to leave. If she admits she was intending to go home, then yes, we'll have to sack her.

I'll try and answer a couple of points...

Ds can open the door using the Yale lock, and he does have a tendency to follow someone out if they're going out the front door so it's possible she double locked it because she didnt' want him wandering in the street.

Outraged You're right about the cultural differences thing, she's not English. I suggested that might have been the situation at the time of the shop incident but several people from the same country as her came on and said they wouldn't have dreamt of leaving a child in a shop alone so I discounted that.

She does have extra insurance to cover our children in her car, she also has up to date first aid (she only updated the course recently). She doesn't have professional insurance, but she's not formally trained (been working in childcare for 12 years).

She does work for another family 2 days a week as well. They absolutely rave about her. If it turns out she was intending to leave my children alone, and I have to sack her, do I tell the other family? We were supposed to be doing a nanny share 1 day a week from Sept until Christmas. They'll want to know why we're not going ahead.

Dh is ok with the nanny, hasn't commented on her much. Grumbles occasionally that she doesn't tidy up much, but that's it and frankly it's the pot calling the kettle black

The handbag is so odd. I would never leave someone else's children alone, but if I did I would literally jump in the car, no handbag, no child. Just car keys and house keys and go.

I've got to decide what to do if DS says she didn't say anything to them, or if he can't remember. If she had said to them "I'm just popping out for five minutes, just sit quietly and be good" it would seem to me that she'd intended to go home, but if she had said nothing to them, would that be worse, that she was intending to go home and not tell them anything? Or if she said nothing does that mean she had no intention of going home and she was geniunely popping out for a minute to check her car (I'd be perfectly fine with that btw)

Is she actually a nanny? As in trained, or just someone that looks after the children? Frankly I wouldn't have trusted any adult again that thinks it's ok to leave a 4 year old in a shop. I wouldn't keep her on.

Her qualifications or lack of them are not even particularly relevant if her actual instincts are so wide of the mark.
Most parents have absolutely no "official" childcare training at all but know perfectly well you don't leave a 4 year old in a public place alone and just wander off. As some posters have mentioned already; these incidents are just the ones you know about.

It might be a bit difficult to find out from DS because she is probably aware that you're on the case and will probably have said something to him like 'you do know I was just popping to the car to get my phone this morning?' if she actually is guilty of something more serious. She must be aware it looked odd, since your DH thought she looked sheepish. Maybe worth asking him if she has ever left them on their own in the house before as well? Don't mean to sound super paranoid but DS might probably won't be aware of the significance at all.

[ head fairy] ......if it turns out your instincts were correct then you definitely have an obligation to tell the other family....otherwise why would you sack her???? She is/ could quite possibly be as irresponsible with regards to the children in the other family!