Useless Nanny has arrived, what shall I do?

[moaningpaper]

Right, I am supposed to have a Nanny for two days to help because of my bad back.

They have sent an unqualified 17 year old who appears clueless around babies.

There are only about 20 people who live in this town so I don't want to offend anyone.

How do I deal with this nicely?

lol, ladymuck! at the butcher!!! Although guess she'd feed your children the better cuts of meat ... out of curiosity which agency was that from or daren't you say???

And I would call agency and say she is totally unsuitable, you asked for a nanny and a nanny is supposed to be qualified or experienced or both and you are meant to be able to leave your children with her and feel safe! She sounds more like a mothers help to me. Have you asked her how much other work she has had from the agency?

It was a local agency rather than a national one. I have to say that I suspect that the agency was trying to make a point - I'd turned down the older lady once before as I had a very boisterous (and large) 2 year old, and wasn't sure that she would be up to it. She was of course wonderful, and we've used her many times since. In fact if she would be willing to take a permanent contract I would gladly go back to work. However she prefers the variety and flexibilty of short term work.

MP - if you're in SE london she might be worth a try though?

At lunchtime she asked for a fag break and I kindly let her go.

She was very sweet, but totally useless. I rang the agency and they said she was clearly awful but didn't apologise. I said I wouldn't need them to find me another Nanny - because they are clearly rubbish.

What an awful day!!!!!

Sorry to hear you experience of having a temp nanny turned out so bad. It's honestly not always like that, at least not if I'm your temp nanny

I don't know what your agreement with the agency was, but the 'match' clearly was not right in this case. A danger of not meeting a nanny before they start working for you, is that you don't know what you are going to get, thus you trust the agency to select someone appropriate. With temp nannies it is often the case that you can't meet the nanny first, so you take the risk, some of the time it works out, other times it doesn't. Pity it didn't work out on this occasion, as being in a small community, if it had worked, you may have used the nanny (and agency) again in the future.

ladymuck- was it an agency called antoinettes by any chance???

Glad to hear you told her to go home and didn't apoliogise to the agency! Why should you??? Well, any news about a new (and suitable) nanny?