Help me frame an "improvement needed" message

[PartyintheKitchen]

Hi everyone,

My first au pair experience and really sadly it's not working out well so far. Au pair is 21, from an agency, trainee nurse at home in Spain, some experience with children and wants to be a nursery school teacher so this is really supposed to be helpful for her - and of course us. I have her for 2 days a week, so 20 hrs per week in charge of 3 DSs, 1, 5 and 8. I pay her £170 per week. The two older DC are in school so it's school drop off, baby throughout the day and then pick up school aged DC, home, snack, homework, dinner. The rest of the time is hers to learn English, explore our home city, meet other au pairs. We're in a big city with a bus link not far from the house. She arrived 2 weeks ago and I've spent two weeks showing her the ropes, the city, involving her in every aspect of our family life to make her feel welcome. I've put together very detailed routine info for the children, been by her side for 2 weeks to make sure she's working it out ok. Yesterday I left her more to herself to see how she would cope and honestly I'm still at the stage where I don't think she's able to mind the 3 children without significant help.

Our main concerns are that (1) she is very unfit and cannot keep up with the children on the way to and from school - often they are not in her sight and she is huffing and puffing to keep up with them. She told me in interview that she loves walking and used to play football so would have no problem with the children and keeping up with them. (2) she doesn't seem to know how to communicate with children. She doesn't initiate many chats with the 2 older children and seems to bark at my 5 yr old out of frustration. She follows the baby about and only picks him up if he cries.

There are other things which are less important but add to the overall experience - her personal hygiene is very poor (4 days without showering). She keeps telling me she is exhausted and has planned to spend the next 4 days relaxing at home to rest after her 2 days work. I honestly don't mind what she does on her days off but it seems a waste to sit about in the house. She has also told me that her preferred activity is relaxing (that wasn't the case in the interview), that she doesn't know how to cook (again, when interviewed she could cook), and that my 5 yr old is impossible for her as she cannot figure out how to communicate with him.

I had to step in yesterday at dinnertime as she was stood watching the pasta boiling while the baby was wailing. Kitchen was a total mess which to be honest I care a lot less about.

I feel she is very much in over her head. I've had a chat with the agency and they have said I need to talk to her about improvement and they will ask her agency to do the same - but if no improvement in the next few days they will arrange another au pair for us no probem. My agency informed her agency who in touch reached out to her - asking her to make more of an effort to meet other au pairs and want to call her to discuss other things (as above). She got a little annoyed with me and asked me not to contact my agency about this type of thing. I made no apologies and said I was only telling the truth - not telling tales. I said I found it hard to hear a 21 yr old say she was exhausted working 2 days a week, she agreed but said she likes to relax a lot.

Help me frame this improvement chat with her - I feel she has to do so much for me to think she's up to this. Urgh. What a disaster. Help! My tummy is in knots this whole past 2 weeks.

Can you sit down with her 1:1 time. Go through the things you like then ask if she can focus on x, y and z? I've found I need to be extremely specific with my au pairs and give them daily timetables of every activity.

To be honest though there seems to be so much wrong with what you've listed it doesn't sounds as though she'd improve to the point you need.

As another comment - why are you paying her £170 for 20 hours per week? That's well above au pair rates which are typically ~£100/week for 25 hours.

The thing is.....au pairs aren't really suitable for looking after 3 children, especially a 1 year old all day for 2 days when they have no experience of nannying. Most untrained people would struggle.
Au pairs don't generally cook well either, you need to leave something to be heated.

I wouldn't have left any of my 7 au pairs with a 1 year old for 10 hours a day.

I think your expectations are too high TBH and I suspect another au pair wouldn't be much better.

I'd suggest you either look into getting a nanny - depending on where you live it may not be that much more than you're paying now. Or put the baby into a nursery for most of the day and get her to do before and after school care.

Thanks for responding!

@roses2 I've done that most days (the 1:1 chats) since she has been with us, I've put together a daily schedule for her as in "1400: feed baby 120mls milk, 1415: dress baby for buggy" etc so it is super detailed and I've shown her all of the different tasks. But I can try again for sure.

Simple dinners for the kids (pasta & sauce, heated up meals etc) so I'm not expecting masterchef by any means.

The agency we use provide girls who are older and have some relevant experience and so the idea is that they can handle 1 yr olds. Hence the higher money offered. Her nursing training had some paediatric care and in interview she seemed totally unphased by 3 kids inc baby. Perhaps I'm looking for too much. A good friend has an au pair from the same agency who is amazing, looks after 3 children inc 7 month old. I would never have considered this solution otherwise. I like the idea of the flexibility and actually enjoy having a young person about the house!

Some of these things are unlikely to change in of energy levels, childcare abilities, etc. In the meantime I would tell her if she can't keep up with the kids when out of the house, she needs to not let them run ahead on the street so they are out of her line of sight - that's a safety issue (and tell the kids they need to stay near her). Most au pairs say they can cook - they might be able to prepare food for themselves back home, but that may not be the same as what's involved in putting together a meal for children/a family and being able to multi-task with cooking and childcare. Getting a good AP is often just a complete gamble. We have only had APs when our kids got older, but even then it hasn't been a very good experience in terms of the help we need, and the most recent AP has mostly just been like having another child in the house ...

Given what you say, the reality is it is unlikely to get better. Can you really imagine she’s going to improve? Can you imagine continuing to live with her and entrust her to your children?

Au pairs can be an absolute joy and godsend. There will be the right one somewhere- or as possible said, a nanny might be better for the time being. You and, especially your children deserve to have someone who makes an effort and can interact and care for children properly. Don’t settle if you’ve got warning bells - the longer you leave it the harder it will be.

20 hours of sole care for a toddler + time with two older children is a nanny job, and an experienced nanny who knows what they are letting Themselves in for. I think she’s the wrong person for the job and also agree you should be looking for a nanny. Your friend struck lucky. Do you know if she is happy with you? Sounds like she isn’t, which might make this easier to handle.

Thanks so much for the posts and input and au pair insight. I really appreciate it, so thank you all.

I had a chat with the AP on Friday afternoon, I asked her how she felt things were going – she said it’s hard but also very good. Hm, she said hard as it’s busy to mind the 3 together but good as she got to the end of the week. I then explained that I thought she wasn’t a natural with children (she genuinely isn’t) and that she needed quite a lot of help from me to make it through the days when she was on duty. I told her that if I had to go back to work this week (I’m on semi-mat leave for another month, working a few days a week from home for a bit to warm up again) I would have taken holidays to support her. In any case I asked her to make more of an effort with the children and I asked her to help a bit more with her chores (laundry – that’s the main thing for me, the laundry is never ending). She has tried to be more communicative with the children but it’s still awkward and she has made a bit of an effort with the laundry – on her list of chores she was to strip the children’s beds this morn and pop the sheets in the wash – she missed the pillow cases (how do you miss them?) and then spent nearly an hour folding half a load of laundry. Jesus wept. I also fed back that she was naturally not a fast walker and so she had to work with the boys to make sure they stay closer to her on the way to school and on the way home (I had also had a word). The school run today she did speed up but ignored my 5 yr old the whole way (he decided to stay behind her – the monkey). So she thinks that getting to the school faster is the thing we needed – more keeping the children safe I was hoping. It has also become clear that she only showers every 4/5 days! I thought it was a once off but not so, she’s had 3 showers in over 2 weeks! I asked her to consider her personal hygiene in the same way we do, showering every day or every other day like the children but it hasn’t stuck. She’s also said that she is stopping English classes as they are no good, that seems a shame – there are so many English schools here she could attend.

Anyways, there you go. A litany of issues. Even if I didn’t have a baby and she was in charge of 2 school going children I wouldn’t be happy. I can’t go ahead with this arrangement so likely tomorrow I will confirm with the agency that she will be finishing with us this week. What do I do next – do I have to book her a flight home? I would happily do it. I’m sure the agency will advise.

We are now 100% sure we need an experienced nanny or childminder – thanks for your clear comments on that. We have a fab lady minding the children 3 days a week – she can’t do the extra days at the moment though so I'll begin the hunt for someone to replace the AP. We had a full time nanny when we lived in London a few yrs back and she was such a godsend, I never had any concerns when she was minding the children. I honestly thought that an “experienced” au pair would be nice for our family, we're fairly well traveled, very open minded and happy to share our culture, home and family life with a young person. I think this experience however has really really put us off. I feel like I’m constantly explaining how to do the most basic of things (eg how to lock 7 yr old's bike to the school bike area – for the 10th time this morn!). On the plus side I have never cooked and cleaned so much so when she goes I’ll feel like I’m on holiday!

Well I wouldn't work for you even if you paid me over board. You sound horrible to work for.
Glad the au pair left.

@Hellabove5 why? Are you the au pair? If so, i’m very sorry that your experience hasn’t worked out...but you shouldn’t have taken the position in the first place just for a little extra money. There are loads of lovely au pair posts to look after children before and after school in the UK.

The original OP asked for advice and took it.