Babysitting - Is it quiet for everyone, or just me?

[nannynick]

I am not doing much evening babysitting this week. Are you finding that evening babysitting work is hard to find at the moment?
Wondering if it's just me... or if every babysitter is finding work a bit scarce at the moment.

definatly a bit scarce for me too, i'm getting 1 or 2 jobs a month at the moment i'm really hoping it picks up soon tho

Me too

I have had four nights cancelled recently as people just can't afford to go out as much as they used to

im still being asked to bs a lot

if anything dh said the other night i seem to be bs more than i used to

i replied that as he is now working till 10pm/or goes fishing as its warmer/lighter so i might as well watch someone elses tv and be paid for it

I blame the recession.

Mind you, I keep getting asked but can't do it because I have something else planned!

for those of you who havent been bs so much

would you reduce your hourly fee by £1/2/3 so you still get some money ?

or go and work for sitter which pay crap a lot less then i charge?

Busy here too but I think I charge less than you NN and have no min stay time so maybe that's why. I'm really ill at the mo though with some cold/flu/cough/sore thoat/snotty thing

I have still been reasonable actually for the summer I am booked to night nanny so cant do any babysits despite number of enquiries. I am still turning down work have rates that same as blondes. I am booked every wed and even booked this sat most work is 30-45mins from home and sat is 1hr from home but charging them for that.

what do you charge navyeyelash?

£7/8 depending on the family. Families I work for as a nanny I charge £7 but new families I charge £8. My website though doesn't mention price and I am open to offers. I've nannied on a Saturday for £6 an hour as a one off.

Am in Bristol btw and a bit of a softie

no point in putting price on a website,as sometimes you will charge more/less

7/8 seems fine for bristol - as some of my friends charge that here, though im a £10ph girl

though even i would balk at £6 on a saturday!!

Not sure about cutting the cost. Has anyone tried that and found it made a significant difference?
I'm finding that website traffic has dropped a lot over recent months... if webtraffic was still high, dropping costs may be an option, but as there is no sign of there being any interest... not sure adjusting prices would help all that much.

It has been really quiet for months and for some strange reason June has been so busy might be the nice weather bringing people out again

Nanny Nick for any work thats within 5miles of my home address I have offered a 25% discount off first 3mths of bookings and not really had a response most of my work is still further away and to justify that I have to charge my full rates (£10 an hr with min of £30 mon-thurs and £12 an hr with a min of £40 fri-sun).

However night nannying offered to anyone who booked 2 nights or more for 4wks or more a 10% discount so basically in a 10hr night they got a free hr and this was attractive to the family who have booked me for summer prob got a longer booking because of this.

suppose its one of those suck it and see things (no rude comments anyone)

So sounds like discounting doesn't really work. 25% off for 3 months is pretty good... but you didn't get any takers.

nannynick, why do you think web traffic had dropped? How do you normally advertise? Could you have dropped down the lists (ie google/gumtree) etc do you think?

Looking at this month v this month last year, traffic drop is about 20%. My ranking in google is still good for local search phrases... have been getting reasonable hits this month from Bing (who were not around last year).
At work the dishwasher repair man said he had seen my car around the area... so the car ad still works in terms of local recognition... but not getting new clients.

Hard to know why there has been a drop, my guess is that parents are just not going out as much - when they do they get friends/grandparents to babysit.

i'm finding there have been alot of last minute cancellations, i get quite a few bookings through sitters, then on the day or day before i get a text saying they no longer need me

i think nick is right, its to do with people staying at home to save money then when they do go out they get family to babysit so they dont have to pay as much.

if on the day or less than 24hrs notice i charge them 4hrs fee so £40

i am often asked to bs and if i got cancelled and had been asked to bs elsewhere i would be annoyed and out of pocket

but i make that very clear to all my famillies i bs for that i charge this and so far noone has ever not been happy with it or not paid mymin fee