Thinking now of getting live-out nanny but they seem to earn more than I do!

[BoffinMum]

I am in Cambridgeshire and currently have an AP - there has been a thread on this as it has been a bit of a saga all round, but suffice it to say I have now had enough. I have a new baby due quite soon.

Nannynick, Blondes and others have very kindly given me a lot of top notch advice on how to recruit a live-in nanny with appropriate salary rates and so on, but after a lot of thought and soul searching, I have decided that best of all would be a live out nanny, because I am now quite bruised from having someone live in my house, and frankly going absolutely nuts from the lack of privacy.

However, having asked around, it seems nannies are asking for £8ph net locally. I grossed this up on Nannytax for the 2 hours a week I am working or commuting, and horrifically, this works out at more than my entire take-home pay, so after paying transport costs to work I will be earning minus £400 a month, which is obviously not an option if I want to stay solvent.

Does anyone have any useful suggestions as to a solution? I have thought about a nanny share, for example, but I don't know much about them.

BoffinMum - personally, yes I would be a bit bored and I don't really like having the mum at home, so doing bits and pieces during maternity leave wouldn't be ideal for me... but I would probably put up with it for the full pay! A good nanny would only need a week, two more for your comfort than hers, to ease in - any more might feel like too much. The longest handover I ever did was a week (and that was with the current nanny rather than the mum) and by Thursday I'd had enough. I wouldn't want her to start before August if you go back to work in September.

Get someone to start sometime in mid-late August, if they are fairly inexperienced. If they are an experienced nanny, just drop them in the deep end

Perhaps word an advert such that it can attract people who can start at various times... for example...
"Sole Charge Nanny wanted to start 1st September. Opportunity to start earlier (shared care with mum) if required."

Do you want someone local to you?
Is Peterborough to far?

waves to boffinmum

no real advice,hope you find someone

agree salarywise is likly to be nearer £60/65 a day - maybe you can agree on a wage for the day and not hourly?

tbh most nannies dont want start a new job with mum on ml for a few months

my 1st employers choose me as they couldnt afford a very exp nanny, i was striaght out from college and had sc care of 4mth and 5yr 55hrs a week

when they moved and i left, they again had a newly qualified nanny,as thay was the only way they could afford to have a nanny

guess what i am saying, is if you like the person, then doesnt matter if they havent got tons of exp as long as you feel they are capable of looking after a nb

Hi Blondes! I think the most important thing of all for me is that I actually like the person and get on well with the baby, so I will make that more of a priority over things like experience when I am trying to decide who is best. As long as they've had a bit of training so they don't do completely daft things, that would probably be all I needed.

Supernanny, Peterborough is about an hour from me, so possibly a bit far really, considering clocking on time is likely to be 7.30 am or thereabouts. You'd have to be pretty superhuman to keep up a schedule like that IMO.

i know a nanny who was in cambridge - not too sure if she still is, i will ask and get back to you

Ta Blondes.
I think we're looking at 1 September start on £300 pw net now after all the advice on this thread. Someone jolly and happy and organised.

I agree alot of it is down to gut feeling.Every nanny has started from somewhere.I got my first nanny job at 18.It was complete sole charge of 3 children of 8mths,2yrs and 5yrs old.I even moved abroad for the job so had no friends,was in a new country with a new language and I managed fine.And I am grateful to that family for giving me that chance

I wouldn't worry about age either. My first nanny job (and I had no training to fall back on, just younger siblings and cousins) was 3 children including a baby. Common sense and getting on with you and your baby are far more important than age - but training will definitely help a bit and experience even more!

FWIW I like the sound of your job (and you as an employer), you sound very sensible!