What is the going rate for a babysitter?

[nangnangnang]

The babysitter in question was my CM so an experienced adult (ie not a 16 year old doing it for pocket money). What would you consider an appropriate hourly rate? She herself had no idea what to charge since it was a one-off.

All suggestions gratefully received.

£5 perhour?

might depend where you are - going rate around here for an experienced sitter is £6.50 ph - Surrey.

We use Sitters and the pay is £5.55 per hour.

I work for an agency and get £7 per hour but there is a minium charge of 4 hours.

i charge £7 per hour ish

(depending on the hours, how much i like babysittig for the family, weather they are already asleep etc)

calzone £5 per hor is not even minimum wage

when i babysit with sitters i get over £6 per hour, but i normally only accept booking for less than 4 hours so im paid minimum 4 hours to make it worth my while

Many thanks for your replies. I'll go with the higher end (£7ish) because she helped us out at short notice and is generally wonderful.

I get 625 an hour and that is through sitters but rates vary depending on area

i pay my 14 year old babysitter £5 per hour .....i wouldn't dream of paying an adult the same amount.

I would think it would be more likely to be £7 - £10 per hour depending on experience

My nanny refuses to BS for less than 8 and says her friends charge 10, so we use her when we have to and also use an agency where the women (all nursery nurses or nannies) charge 6-7 on weekday nights and 8-10 on Saturdays.

I know there is all this minimum wage thing, but if you are actually paying somebody to sit on your settee and watch your TV and eat your food, it is not exactly working is it? I get paid £2/hour for being on call from work.

I get £6-£10 an hour...depending on whom I am sitting for

Friends get mates rates..rich people have to pay me more LOL

Jenna

We pay £6 per hour in Edinburgh for a delightful and very competent medical student whom His Nibs now adores. Secretly hoping that she'll fail her exams and become a nanny for us!

I know there is all this minimum wage thing, but if you are actually paying somebody to sit on your settee and watch your TV and eat your food, it is not exactly working is it? I get paid £2/hour for being on call from work.

But it's not about just sitting on the settee and watching TV etc. It's about being out of your own home at night, potentially working late and what you might have to do dealing with children that wake up upset/wet/hungry, or if there's a fire and you have to evacuate, or if a child gets ill and has to be rushed to hospital (meningitis in particular can develop very quickly, certainly in the space of an evening out and that has happened to me in the past).

Equally children aren't always in bed when the sitter arrives so they have to do bedtime, which is twice as hard for sitters as it is for parents because a lot of the time children want to play with the sitter, because they're new and fun and exciting and haven't seen the latest toy/game, and then they may try to test boundaries (can't I stay up for 5/10/15 more minutes) and simple things like teeth-cleaning can be more difficult....

It can be hard work.

I charge 7.00 per hour in Hertfordshire.

My children are in bed for 7.30 so yes, I am paying for somebody to be responsible for them and being out of their own home of an evening but in my quite comfortable home. However they are still not actually doing anything, unless of course that emergency situation arose.

And, I have been a babysitter as a teen where the child/children were not in bed. And that is quite a different scenario, I agree, because all of what you say rings true.

Just found this thread which is just what I was looking for - thanks again fellow Mumsnetters

Quick extra question: it's my first time using a babysitter - does anyone have any tips/advice?

Thanks!

I recommend:
Show her where the candles are in case of a power cut!
Show her where you keep 1st aid kit.
Leave emergency contact for you, GP surgery and a neighbour/family member in case you're unavailable.
Show her how the TV works/what food she's welcome to help herself to.
Say that you'll check in a couple of times just so she's prepared and knows you're not being neurotic.
Leaving written instructions about what to do if any of the children wake up/special routines etc to get them to calm down/go back to sleep

£7.50 where we are-but that is for dd's nursery nurse, so we pay her normal hourly rate x

Our babysitter advertisers her babysitting services for £3.50/hr. We told her we wanted to give her £5.00 so that pleased her a lot.

Was recently chatting to a nanny (in her 30s with 2 children of her own) who said the family she is a nanny for, pay her less than they pay their cleaner - and she's looking after their adorable child!!!

Thanks frannikin

Wow luciemule - I'm stunned that your sitter asks for as little as £3.50 - I'm pretty sure I used to get more than that when I went babysitting about (ahem) 20 years ago!

Gosh, there seems to be so much variation in what people pay/ask for...

My Sitter is a Childminder and charges her hourly rate of £3.50. Most of our friends pay her that for babysitting but I looked on MN and chose to pay her £5 an hour. Not because I am loaded but I wanted her to know we valued what she was doing for us.

Mai I suggest you also show babysitter the heating so they can keep warm!

Oh definately - we forgot and the heating went off at midnight, we got in at 1.30 to find her huddled under her coat