How much should I be paying an au pair per week

[BobbyeinArkansas]

-London
-1 primary school age child
-20 hours max per week. (Basically drop off and pick up 5 days a week.
-no housework.
-weekends free.

on aupairworld one of the girls I’m conversing (aged 19) with told me she expects £150, gym membership, language classes, travel card, phone. Seems punchy.

Another told me she hopes to be able to save money for uni. Not sure what she’s expecting but it’s hard to save on an au pair “salary” unless her expectations and mine are out of sync. I haven’t asked her yet.

The au pair world guidance says £85 per week but this also seems low.

If you have an au pair, what do you pay her, and do you add anything on eg gym membership?

thanks in advance.

The problem is au pairs are like gold dust. So people can ask for what they want.

We paid £100 a week in London and (we now live in Paris) E120 a week here for very similar hours but two primary-age children. We also pay half the cost of language classes, cover a return ticket and are scrupulous about paying an hourly rate for any extra hours (e.g. during school holidays). But I think the situation in the UK now has probably changed a good deal as it is now basically impossible to come as an EU au pair isn't it, unless you are already there? So there's a diminishing pool of au pairs who probably are in a position to negotiate! That's obviously not the case in France and we can offer quite a good deal in terms of location etc (central Paris).

Thanks. I’ve had a lot of interest on au pair world from Europeans, I haven’t asked about status.. I think I’ll suggest £125 per week and see what happens.

On a completely separate note, we are getting a lot of interest from African and South American countries, would the assumption be that we will sponsor them for visas?

We have never had an au pair before and we have only just started the process hence the questions..

Ina addition to travel expenses to/from their home, I paid £90 pw in London plus Oyster card for 20 hours per week, 2 primary age children. No gym membership or other extras. In retrospect, I would have paid more pw and no free Oystercard. If the au pair is staying longer than 6 months, you will need a visa, yes. Good luck, OP. Our first was a gem and we're still in touch. The second one was extremely problematic and we had to cancel her contract and send her home after a month. We found both on aupairworld.

gym membership, language classes, travel card, phone

These items can vary wildly in price - it depends very much if you already have a gym membership, add her to your private phone contract, what zones travel, etc.

Neighbour in London pays £110 p/wk plus car, parking, phone, and language classes. But slightly more hours than you and AP drives the DC.

The au pair is very good though and is invaluable to the family so worth it for them.

We pay £100 per week for similar hours and provide a car and all fuel and insurance. But we are very rural midlands! I'd say £130 plus travelcard in London, and maybe offer to pay flight to get to you. One au pair asked that of us.

EU citizens can still come as visitors for 6 months, which as they are only paid pocket money like a teenage member of the household would be, that should be OK.

@BobbyeinArkansas our first au pair here in Paris we sorted out (and paid for) the visa for her, since she was from the UK and wasn't already in France -- this wasn't terribly expensive but it was a lot of admin faff. Our current one was already here on a valid au pair visa (from the US), so we have just had to help her with transferring her registration to us and covering the cost of her health insurance. We have had lots of au pairs over the last 5 years and have mostly found it a good arrangement, though you have to be realistic about your expectations & be prepared to offer quite a lot of practical (and occasionally emotional) support. Also we have found that there's a big difference between au pairs of 18/19 (gap year stage) and ones just a year or two older.

That’s interesting re the age groups. We’ve had a lot of interest from the gap year crowd and I do feel that that is quite young. But we do have the occasional 21 year old applying which is more appealing. It’s whether we appeal to them I suppose.

Thanks for all the info, it’s invaluable.
I was an au pair in France back in the day at the age of 17/18/21 and I was absolutely hopeless.

Do not do this. You can not be an au pair on a 6 month visit visa.

See visa requirements here:
https://www.gov.uk/au-pairs-employment-law/au-pairs

The VISA type doesn't allow them to work unfortunately, even as an au pair.

It's not possible to sponsor an au pair in the UK, so you're limited to Canadians, Australian, New Zealanders (who can get a youth mobility visa), other british people and EU citizens who have a right to remain because they were resident previously. It's also worth looking at South Africans as sometimes they have british parents and a passport.

It is very difficult to get an au pair at the moment.

We paid £120 plus gym and they had a car. Our next door neighbour has an au pair starting next week and she asked for £150 - which annoyingly falls into the realm of needing to register as an employer. It's a bit of a pain at the moment and the government needs to sort it out.

Our best au pairs have all been a bit older, but in that bracket they tend to be looking for shorter placements as well (e.g. just over the summer, or for a semester rather than a whole year), so we found it was a balance between commitment & consistency for the children and competence! We are a bilingual (French/English) family, so a big motivation for us has always been the language -- to have French speaking au pairs when in the UK and now English speaking ones here in France. We were lucky to be honest to leave the UK just as it became pretty much impossible to get a French au pair there, I'm not sure what we'll do when/if we go back.

It's normal to get a lot of interest from au pairs who have no chance of ever obtaining a visa. You need to ignore them or at least ask them right at the start whether they are already in possession of a visa

It seems like you haven't researched this very much. It's a lot harder than you're imagining. I just wanted to mention that doing any kind of work as a visitor is illegal even if its 'just pocket money'!! You need to look for people who already have status / visa for the UK. I would advise you to look for other alternatives personally

Hey, I'm looking into au pair rates at the moment, but can see the UK Government says that au pair's are entitled to the minimum wage - and a capped Accommodation offset rate of £78.62 a week. This makes £100ish a week a very low amount of hours per day - does anyone know if this law came in after this thread was discussed, or if there is something I'm missing?

@KLaw1987 yes, it’s changed since the last post. I think it was 5th April 2024 when the new rates came in.

Getting an au pair is really tricky still, even with the increased rates. In reality it’s only Canadians and Australians plus a few British and Irish people who want to live away from home for a bit as they’re the only ones who can get a visa.
Unless you’re in London, the scarcity of fellow au pairs makes them not stay very long either.

I think really the 'going rate' for au pairs now, to the extent that au pairing is still a thing post Brexit, is more like c £200 for c 20 hours a week, plus of course all food and bills paid for etc. Supply and demand.