Anyone had a demi-pair/room in exchange for help set up?

[EdenX]

We currently have a traditional au pair, however I will be going on mat leave soon with 3rd child so won't actually need any childcare. I feel like what I will need is some help with cleaning and a night of babysitting a week would be great, plus we will miss having an extra pair of hands in an emergency (for eg I recently had to take a DC to hospital and au pair was on hand to babysit the other one).

We have a spare room. In the past we have hosted language students on a basis of providing a room, Internet and laundry facilities and breakfast and dinner, for £100 a week. I was thinking about offering a similar set up in exchange for 3 hours cleaning a week and some babysitting. Anyone successfully done similar?

Minimum wage under 21 is £5.60.

Fair enough. I will leave it at that.

So you want 10 hours/week for £42? That's not £5.60/hour. LOL @ charging them, too, for all the other stuff.

£56 expat, I don't really mind whether they want to have family meals or would rather take the cash and buy their own. We certainly spend more than £14 a week per adult on food so it would save us money to pay them cash. However, I have a feeling most people seeking this kind of set up want to live as part of a family, practice their English during mealtimes and family activities etc.

So.. if op charged 100 pw for room and board, she would get £100 in

If she then paid that same person minimum wage for cleaning and babysitting say 10 hours a week, she would pay out £56

How is what she is proposing any worse?

Practice their English? Hmm. You are still mixing up an au pair and a UK taxpayer. If you want someone from abroad (or can only get someone from abroad) you should be meeting the standard T&Cs for an au pair: providing meals, pocket money, transport etc. It isn't supposed to be a penny pinching exercise!

I'm not opposed to a UK student, but generally "living with a family" arrangements appeal most to young people from abroad who want to travel or improve their English. When we did home stays in the past, funnily enough it was all exchange students/language students (and god knows how much they paid to stay with us given we were paid £100 a week).

But it is still an au pair, fundamentally. You still shouldn't be charging them extra for food/TV, etc. Not if they are meant to be 'living as part of the family' - as I say, they're not a lodger. The purpose isn't so you break even.

If it's to practice their English then you need to hire on an au pair basis rather than trying to penny pinch. I've read the whole thread now and you keep trying to justify not paying properly for services and trying to eek out, be tight and effectively take advantage of someone. That's despicable.

You don't want to hire a cleaner to come in during the week and a babysitter because you're not willing to pay what they command for their services and you want a person to be on tap for you.

Why not just go back to letting the room out to language students or take in a proper lodger and then using the money to pay properly for the services you want?

OK, lets call them a lodger. I will offer a room and board for £100. If they want, they can do 10 hours cleaning/babysitting for £100. Same outcome.

IT doesn't seem so unreasonable to me. I have had a lodger paying me £470 per month which paid for about half out nanny's wage when we required a (part-time, live out) nanny. Now that my youngest is 4.5 and I require minimal home childcare, it would kind of make sense to have a similar arrangement to that the OP proposes with a student with no childcare qualifications doing 3 hours childcare thrice a week and having plenty of time to study/do other work. I am substantially better off renting out the room for 470 and paying £8/9 an hour for the hours I need to a different person for childcare but, whilst I acknowledge it could be open to abuse, it would just seem sensible to roll it into one if it worked for both parties. I'm not sure why free room rental as part payment is soooo abhorrent-any room rental in our area costs similar and offering it in exchange for childcare to the value of the rental (or in reality I'd be happy with about £360 per month worth of childcare so a decent saving on a room) is not inherently unfair! Over 5 years, some of our lodger's have actively wanted the security of living in a busy family home and have loved being with the kids. We never suggested rent reduction in exchange for childcare but it would certainly have been liked by two of them who asked if it would be possible!! We declined because at that stage the kids were younger and required professional childcare but now it would seem fine except of course the law leaves us substantially out of pocket vs lodger plus separate childcare so we don't. Of course, it is only worth it to someone who would be needing to rent in the area-but what's wrong with that?

A lodger has a tenancy agreement. If the lodging is tied to employment then the agreement reflects that and his/her employment contract reflects all the conditions of that employment separate from the tenancy. Because they are two separate things. Most lodgers are not also live in employees of their employer. Not the same thing. But keep telling yourself that to justify to yourself.

But they are not a lodger. Your legal obligations to a lodger are different. Their legal obligations to you are different. We have guidelines on the minimum wage and au pair wages for a reason.

That makes sense, expat, and I can see the sense in separating renting and employment for the lodger and employee's security. Ultimately, I don't think the OP is coming at it intending to exploit though. It is just a natural thought of a mutually beneficial arrangement rather than two separate arrangements. Fair enough, it's not legal to protect the lodger and so it can't be done. But it's different from somebody actively trying to minimise payment!

Bythebeach:

Is there any other reason for her to do it than to minimise payment? Not trying to be funny at all, I just can't see it.

I take it you OP no longer requires the "au pair" to be available for emergencies as this would imply that the person would need to be on-call for OP but would restrict the ability to take other work or study and would need to be paid.

I'm sure that OP will find someone desperate enough to come to London or looking for a cheap party summer to accept these terms - but who knows whether they will be good at childcare and housekeeping especially as it is unpaid

I'm not sure Trifle. It does seem a v low minimum wage she hopes to offer. Naively, I just thought the mutual benefit might have been the appeal. Like I mentioned, that sort of set up actually appeals to students or other people who may wish to lower or negate the rent they pay by fitting a few hours work around other commitments. It would definitely only appeal to me if both parties benefitted!

op when I saw 93 posts I knew you were in for a pasting.

Something like this set up exists on the other side of the channel - I have heard it mentioned on here before. There were a couple of expat posters. It was as you describe,accommodation in exchange for help around the house and babysitting. I even recall 12 hrs being mentioned (life wasted on Mumsnet.)

I am not sure this thing exists now or how it may have been regulated.

What would happen if you met a student interested in the arrangement and were both happy? Sod all, I venture. In London accommodation is easily north of 150 pw.

What would worry me about doing this with a stranger is the blurred lines between employer and landlord and host etc. You'd need to think through his you could ask them to go at if it didn't work out. Someone could decide you were a landlord and an employer etc. I think it's probably safest to stick with one of the more established arrangements.

Bythebeach:

Both parties may benefit but if you read the OP's posts, I'm sure you won't think I am totally daft for thinking her first concern is her own benefit. Which is fine by me, as long as she isn't taking the piss out of someone else.

Honestly OP I don't get the vitriol. A young person comes to England for the summer. She finds herself a job in Costa / in John Lewis / in a pub or wherever. She stays in your house for free and in return she does one night of babysitting and 2 hours cleaning. Her parents know that she's somewhere safe with a nice family who presumably are not taking advantage over and above the arrangement, she gets to save / spend all her earnings and everyone makes a new friend. I would be very happy for my child to do this.