Can I just sack the nanny if she turns out to be unreliable?

[Harbourgirl]

Long time lurker here who has found this board very helpful as I am about to employ a nanny for the first time. I thought I had found gold but am now concerned about the nanny's reliability. She was supposed to have four settling sessions but two of them have been cancelled with about an hour's notice due to emergencies, an email which was sent to her asking for some necessary information wasn't read until I chased her, she has postponed coming over to sign the contract as something cropped up at the last minute & a couple of other things have happened. I want to give her the benefit of the doubt as, if the emergencies were genuine (and I have no reason to think that they weren't), they are the sort of thing that could happen to anyone and I would want my employer to by sympathetic & supportive. However, if this sort of thing continues once she is working for us, we are going to have real problems and would have to make alternative arrangements.
If she does prove to be unreliable, can I just get rid of her or would I have to go through the full disciplinary process? My experience of unreliable colleagues at work over the years is that once they're in the disciplinary process, they tend to become even more unreliable.
As I said, I want to give her the benefit of the doubt but, as we haven't signed the contract yet, I'm wondering whether it would be better to just cut my losses now.
I did ask her referees about her reliability and they all said that she was reliable.
Any advice?

Cut your losses. Unreliable childcare is worse than no childcare.

If she is currenyly working she might not have time. Are you paying her for settling in sessions?

She isn't working at the moment but studying. The times were agreed in advance with her and, yes, of course we're paying her.

Could it be the case she hasn't thought through her studying commitments properly? This has come up before with us. Timings of classes/class work demands greater than she anticipated.

Best thing to do is talk to her.
In your contract have 4-6 weeks probatinary period. 1 weeks notice either way. This is standard in nanny contracts.
This will give you opportunity to assess her reliability.

I think it might be that she has had to do more than expected but I would have hoped that she would have told me more than 2 hours in advance. I am also concerned as, last time we met, she was telling me how stressed she was and how she was struggling to fit everything in and yet she is planning on working for me two days a week which is obviously going to reduce the time she has to fit everything else in.
I am going to talk to her but just think it will be easy for her to say of course she is reliable, of course she is going to turn up etc but it may turn out to be different.
Yes, we do have a six week probationary period.

If she's unreliable before starting the job, when she should be trying to impress you, I can only imagine she'll get worse. She may be busy or have emergencies but to cancel/not turn up at such short notice is unprofessional and I'd be having a chat before she started about reliability and what you expect. Have you asked her references about her reliability/work ethic? If not, I'd be ringing them again.

You can give 4 weeks notice (sack) nanny at any time with no reason, up until 2 years when redundancy kicks in. ACAS says this.

She's already unreliable, I would just cut your losses now.

She is already being unreliable before she even starts, and has told you she's struggling to cope even without this new commitment?!

You rely on your nanny so much that this is HUGELY important.

It's become clear to me (nanny employer, not nanny) that it's actually really, really hard even for a very organised, committed person to be as reliable as you need your nanny to be - what with illness, traffic, snow, and all the unexpected things life throws at you.

It might feel painful to cut your losses now and start again, but it's the lesser of two evils - by quite a long way.

You would be able to get rid of her after she's started, but it would be a painful process to find someone new, wait for their availability, do settling in etc once you are back at work. And all on top of dealing with her unexpected absences until you decide enough is enough.

AVOID!

As employer of nanny (had two brilliant and really reliable ones and I know how important it is), I agree with Strawberrybubblegum. Our nannies did have emergencies thrown at them, but I have seen ours handle them so much better with better planning and foresight. I don't like the sound of your potential nanny flapping at last minute like she did not expect anything at all and not communicating. That will crop up over again definitely. Will you be able to handle it?

I know it sounds odd that her previous referees said she was reliable normally and it makes you want to be sympathetic that she may be in tough period commitmentwise, but my experience with contacting referees is that they are often reluctant to emphasise 'not so great' points. They may have had her when she wasn't so committed.

Just to update that we parted ways with our nanny over the weekend &, beneath the panic of having to find alternative childcare at short notice, I felt a huge sense of relief.
Thank you all for your thoughts & advice.

Thanks for the update - I know it's too easy for us to tell to AVOID, when it's not easy finding a nanny. Glad you feel the sense of right decision made.

Good luck, there are definitely a few golden ones out there - you'd be able to tell straightaway.