Is this a nanny or aupair job?

[SmileyMylee]

I had been planning to get an aupair to help with my 3 DC (9,7 and 4) and new puppy. All the children are in full time school. I was planning to stay at home but circumstances have now changed.

I will now be going back to work and am 'debating' with my DH on whether we need an aupair or nanny. He is looking primarily on the financials and wants an aupair.

We need someone 5 days a week to do the morning school run and the after school pick up and look after the children until we get home. (so roughly 8.15 - 9.15 and 3.00 to 6.30) During the school holidays we would need more hours but we may be able to supplement the aupair with a temporary nanny.

Because we now have the puppy, I don't want to leave him alone during the day. I would also suggest we need someone say 12 - 3 to look after the puppy, take him for a walk and play with him. Any time left over, could be spent putting a load of washing in, putting clothes away or tidying children's rooms. (We have a cleaner and an ironing service). We would also get a puppy walker in for an hour in the morning. (say 10 ish).

As the children are now at school DH thinks an aupair would be sufficient. However I always believed that an aupair shouldn't have sole charge - but then again given the ages of my children is this essential? Also nannies I have had in the past would have turned their noses up at any puppy duties or housework. I'd also prefer not to have someone 'live in'.

So my questions are:

• is this a job for an au pair or nanny?
• if a nanny, would anyone be interested in these hours/duties?
• what would be the relative costs of both? We live in South East London / Kent borders.

Thanks for any help you can give me.

without the puppy it would be a fairly typical aupair job. i think you might find a dog lover aupair /perhaps someone leaving their own dog at home?/, who would look after the puppy as well. that would bring you to seven hours a day as you suggest it, which is in my opinion the highest number of hours you should make an aupair+ work. you said you dont want to leave the puppy alone all day - would you still want the person to be at home in the morning? in that case you couldnt count that as a free time. saying all that, aupairs live in as part of the package. so perhaps you should be looking for live out mothers help/nanny dog lover who would come in every day. or two separate people for children/household and teh puppy.

How old is the puppy?
I would go for an au pair but bear in mind if you want the puppy played with you will need to recruit carefully (there are lots of dog-loving au pairs out there) and pay would be nearer the max (most people would stop at the cut-off for NI/tax which is about £100 per week). On top of that there is the expense of feeding the au pair (very dependent on the au pair, we've had one that doubled our food bill!), heating house during day, car/travelcard costs, and any other perk you may consider (gym membership, mobile phone).
I'm out of date on nanny salaries these days but I guess it would be £400-500 net plus a big wodge of tax on top, and although nanny's will do child-related tasks (kids washing), they tend to be a lot stricter about what they are prepared to do compared to an au pair.
Our au pair has sole charge before and after school for up to 3 hours at a time. My children are both school age and all of our au pairs have been fine to be sole charge for short times with them.
She also does a bit of light cleaning each day and walks our dog. We don't ask her to be in during the day to keep the dog company but she is in a lot - pops to gym or occasional coffee with friends but is in the house a lot during the day. When dog was younger we had a professional dog walker who would take her out for a couple of hours in the middle of the day, but she didn't need that for long. (Puppy walker was £12 per day)
During school hols we use holiday clubs, grandparents and we have had 'holiday nannies' (we had a fab uni student who was training to be a teacher).

The puppy is only 9 weeks and I would be going back to work when he is 14 weeks old. I really hadn't planned to go back to work when we got the puppy but there has been a significant change in circumstances.

I think then that a combination of puppy walker, au pair from 12pm and a holiday nanny may work. I'll also look into whether DH and myself can work from home for 1 day a week each.

Thanks