Ok so I think we have found a live out nanny but as a newbie I need lots of advice!!

[JudgeJudyAndExecutioner]

She is someone that already knows my 3 boys well, as she works at their nursery, by pure coincidence she is advertising for work as she wants to leave. With my 4th boy due in July, so that's a 3 yr old, 2 yr old 1 yr old and a newborn it's going to be much cheaper to employ a nanny than pay a nursery.

If we are going to employ her I need to know what I do assuming that the interview goes well. In my previous life I was a manager but as everyone I know keeps reminding me a nanny is very different.

So here come all my newbie dumb questions...

I am assuming she needs a contract of employment, how on earth do I do that?

What happens with sickness or (gulp!)maternity?

Someone mentioned Nannytax to me regarding dealing with NI and Tax can anyone tell me more.

What happens with holiday entitlement, how much etc.

What about breaks or lunch hours?

Is there anything obvious I am overlooking that I need to think about?

I don't know the answers to most of your questions, but check your nursery contract. Sometimes you are prevented from employing nursery staff within a time period, or have to pay the nursery something.

Does this person have sole care experience? I'd imagine going from a busy nursery to 4 children under 3 could be quite a challenge. Those ages would scare me TBH. (I'm a mum though not a nanny, just reading this thread as I have an ap).

Example Nanny Contract - use as something to start from, it will need to be changed to reflect your nannies specific duties... also I feel the Gross Misconduct section needs to have a lot more examples.

BusinessLink website has a holiday entitlement calculator.

Tax - search my posts containing "P49", should come up with lots of tax info.

Nannies don't get breaks or lunch hours - this is something to discuss at interview, as this is a difference between working in a nursery and working as a nanny.

I was going to post . Keep this bumped for Nannynick he knows everything . Morning Nick

For sickness write SSP only into the contract, but then you are free to pay her if you wish. I have never net paid a sick day. But, I would hold the money back if I thought she was pulling a sickie. If you write a fixed term contract for the first year, it expires when it expires and you are free to replace her then. So if she turns up pregnant you won't have to save the position and pay an inflated temp nanny salary while you wait for her to return any time in her 12 months off.

I use nannypaye.co.uk, which is cheaper than nannytax.co.uk.

4 weeks plus bank hols is pretty standard. Some people let the nanny choose two of those weeks. Other choose them all. I write an annual fixed term contract and we sit down before it is written and agree the holidays together. If she says she'd like a particular week off, I try to accommodate. But, I do ask her to take it when I can also take it (i.e. when the kids are not in school).

No such thing as a break or lunch hour. They sit down for a rest when they can (i.e. when kids are napping or at school)

Oh, and cat me if you would like a my sample contract.

And, yes, as already mentioned, check your nursery contract to see if they will expect to be paid a fee (most of them do).

Glad you have someone you like - think manin poitn someone said, is check with nursery, if the NN can work for you - many do have that clause in their contract and cant work for a family whose children were at that nursery for 3mths - 3 friends have this.

I still think 2 weeks ssp is fair, but athene and I disagree over this plus from a nannys view a fixed term contrcat to avoid paying smp/temps seems harsh BUT can understand it from a employers view, though think you can claim back 105% of what you pay her - Nick is this true?

4weeks holiday is standard,both choose 2 weeks, and some employers ask for 3mths notice of holidays.

No nannies dont get a lunch break, even if child is asleep, obviously we cant pop to shop for sandwich but when mine are asleep/school etc I will relax and read/go on internet - all with mb permission

Nannytax will send you a sample contract if you subscribe to them. They give you printed payslips for you to give to your nanny with the pay (you need to pay the nanny in net), and then every quarter they tell you how much tax & NI you need to pay directly to the IR.

re contract i think you need to have a good get-out clause in case things go wrong. A 3 month probationary period with a 1 week notice period on both sides, extendable to 6m, is a good idea.

Make sure nanny understands how you are working out your holidays. It's not enough to give them a contract and expect them to read and understand it, because many people (not just nannies!!) don't read contracts in detail. You need to sit down and talk through the contract.

When I switched from nursery to nanny, one of the biggest unforeseen changes was the cost of food and outings, which was of course inclusive in nursery feels. I think you need to look at your overall budget for these things, decide on an approach and communicate your expectations. For example, who is going to provide/pay for nanny's lunch and dinner and tea breaks. I think different nannies have different ideas about this, and the important thing is not to assume that your idea matches your nanny's, otherwise there is great scope for resentment later.

For example, do you want your nanny (and any nanny friends and charges that come over) to

• help themselves to any food in the house for lunch, coffee breaks, dinner? What if kids eat at 4pm, does the nanny still eat an adult-portion dinner with them?
• buy themselves lunch with your money if they are out? presuambly OK, but are you OK if it cost £20 each time?
• buy themselves coffee and muffin in a cafe every day? Where I live this could cost nearly £10.

other budget issues - expenses for nanny's mobile phones?

Hope it works out well - I've worked as a manager in a corporate environment for 10 years and employing a nanny has been totally different. Many of the assumptions made in a corporate environment don't seem to apply in the nanny world and different expectations are made - hence vital to have good communication channel with them.

I'm not suggesting to not pay smp. WRiting a fixed term contract will not get you out of that anyway. If she makes her qualifying week, you will have to stump up the maternity pay (but obviously get reimursed). What I could not afford is to have to save her job for 12 months while paying an inflated fee for a temp nanny. I simply couldn't afford it. Temp nannies are much more expensive, and rather thin on the ground I expect. A temp live-in nanny would have to not only find a new job, but move house on a month's notice when permanent nanny announced her return to work.

So, all a fixed term contract protects me from is:
1- Having to save the job after the contract expires.
2- Having to make her redundant if it all goes wrong. (of course this is only really an issue after 2 years of employment anyway)

I agree with imananny that trying to wriggle out of maternity obligations is a bit morally suspect. I think as an employer you have to accept that you have certain responsibilities towards your employees, even if they don't work out in your favour.

I thin kas an employee, you have to understand and accept that employers liabilities have legal limitations. Lots of people don't get any maternity rights/pay at all. And you should be thankful for what you do get.

For example:
contract workers
small business owners (i.e. childminders)

You are not hard done by on the maternity issue.

I'm sorry, but I don't think people should be grateful for what they have just because others have a worse time Lots of nannies do get treated very badly over maternity issues.

Oh, and if I had a pregnant nanny and she wanted to take off say 2 months and return to work full time, I'd be willing to entertain some temp care for a couple of months. I could work with that. But, not 12 months and I'll come back when I feel like it with one mon't notice.

I have a right and an obligation to my family to protect my own finances so that I can continue to provide my children with quality care. What I have suggested here is legal and in my opinion a fair balance between trating the nanny well and protecting my ability to keep financially afloat.

If I could afford to pay a temp nanny for a year I probably would. But, I can't.

Oh, and Rachel, lots of people of all professions are treated badly over maternity rights. But, I don't think we are talking about the hardship of a fixed term employment contract.

Incidentally, you can continue to write fixed term contracts for about 4 years before the arrangement will be considered permanent.

I got the nanny recruitment agency to send me a draft contract!

I do my own tax and NI its really simple as HMRC run a simplified deductions scheme using a P12 form and all you have to do is fill in how much the nanny earns and the tax and NI which you fill in from a look up table, and you send the money to HMRC every 3 months. You also have to do a pay slip every month, but that takes about 10 minutes to do!

SSP and SMP you claim back from the Government on the P12 form.

I give my Nanny 4 weeks holiday I pick 2 of those weeks and she picks 2 and then I pay her for her minimum contracted hours for those weeks.

Ýou can also pay 40p per mile for any use of her own car without her needing to pay tax on it.

Isn't it ironic that there is a disagreement between Maternity Rights when the job in question is looking after children. Lol. I see both sides of the arguement tbh, I just suspect that Anthea is more willing to be upfront. One thing I don't agree with is when a MB gets pregnant+expects her nanny to leave her job for upto x amount of months+then come back when it suits the MB... Although not anything I've ever experienced but I gather it happens a lot!

Missiesparkles, you can't a nanny to leave her job and come back cause YOU are pregnant. I suppose you could make her redundant and then offer her the new position when it came up again... maybe? Sounds dodgy, actually. I wouldn't do it.

I was let off the hook when I was pregnant with DS (my second and last child). Things had gone wrong with nanny. I was pondering how to get rid of her. And she beat me to it by resigning. So I hired the next one when I went back to work.

But, I don't know anyone who let's the nanny go for their own maternity leave.

As I said, its not something I've personally experienced, I've heard that its happened to a few nannies thou!
It seems to be a pretty common grumble on NJ

Oh. There now. See. I'm not that bad of an employer after all.

Having been an avid reader of some of your threads, I assure you I have been employed by a couple of people who would make you blush. Lol.
Obviously not my current employers who are really lovely... Although I am possibly biased due to the fact they let me leave 4 hours early to see the Cure last month

Takes a lot to make me blush, you know.

as missie and rahrah said, there seems to be a lot of employers who get rid of their nanny while they are on ML

I personally think this is so wrong

TBH I dont know many nannies who take 12mths off as they just cant afford it - us nannies work as we need money to pay bills/mortgage etc - though I do love my family/job - many nannies I know dont

Friends who have had babies and gone back to their jobs, normally go back when baby is 3mths old

I assume in your job,you would get paid smp AND you would be welcone to go back to your same job/hours/money etc - so why should it be different for nannies?

Athene - never said you were a bad employer

well the worst thing I can think of off the top of my head was when one employer decided to swan off on a private jet for a hen night+neglect to tell me when she would be back. She was gone for 3 days. This was Thurs thru to Sat night, so on Thurs night I had 3 very upset children wanting to know where Mummy was+when we called her, she was too drunk to talk+pressed answer so we could hear her drunkenly shouting.
I hadn't been told to babysit btw+the Dad sent a driver for them on the Friday...

I'd like to point out I was an 18 year old Mothers Help at the time too

I reckon thats pretty blush worthy!!

why is everyone blushing

For general employment things, the Business Link website is quite handy. While not aimed at employers of nannies, as a lot of the employment legislation applies, their advice and tools can be useful for employers of nannies.

Holiday Entitlement has changed recently and will change again in 2009. Therefore, my advise is to use the Annual Leave Calculator at Business Link, to calculate the leave entitlement for the current year, and the following year.

If your nanny is working for you full-time, and if doing maths does not scare you, then I would say give doing the Payroll a go yourself. HMRC provide quite a bit of help these days, a CD-ROM with forms and calculators, online returns, plus a helpline. I suggest paying your nanny MONTHLY not weekly, as then you are doing far less payroll runs.

One thing I will say is one area which coming up on Mumsnet with regard to nannies, is communication. Try to have a system in place which enables you to discuss things with your nanny as soon as it arises, and also enable your nanny to talk with you. Small issues can quickly escalate into major problems, if they are not discussed. So make time to discuss the small things. Not sure what the ideal soluition is... some families use a nanny diary, others have weekly review chats over a cup of coffee, others just raise things as and when necessary.