House Rules For Aupairs

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Hi we have a new Aupair and I'm just putting together a pack listing her duties and wanted to put in some house rules without sounding to draconian does anyone haave examples of house rules that I can adapt?

Ameriscot at ten minutes a week to phone home. How would you feel about that if your daughter were an au pair?

I also think over-strictness might mean the AP will feel the need to rebel and do things sneakily behind your back.

It's more than I've ever spoken to my mother, so I'm sure I'd feel find about this deal for my own daughters. Part of being an au pair is leaving your own family!

There's nothing stopping them from using their own mobiles, emailing or even putting pen to paper! In "my day", it was letters or a one-minute phone call, so they have it good nowadays.

Also, I'm not suggesting timing calls to the millisecond - but giving them a 10 minute (or 20 minute or fiver a week - whatever), you are giving a guideline that you can call in if necessary. Obviously if the au pair is otherwise a gem, then you are going to be slack with these kind of limits. It's all judgment and the main thing you are trying to avoid is gassing to their mates on your dollar.

Jura,

I would suggest that whatever you put in writing make it more of a "welcome pack", and mixture of positive things - such as maps of the area, bus timetables, phone numbers etc - as well as the negative sounding "rules".

Also things like "DO make yourself lunch", "Feel free to have a bath/shower every day" etc."

Jura, thanks for the compliment. The house rules were mine but I changed my name some time back because I had a rant about my au-pair on MN and was then terrified she might recognise my log-in name if she went on-line

My DD eats at child minder and DP & I v rarely eat at home given that we often have main meal at lunch, travel a lot for work and spend most week ends at our 2nd home (without AP). So basically no such thing as a sit down family meal. Was thinking about giving AP a shelf in fridge and cupboard and giving her money each week to buy own food. To be honest currently it is a strain having to buy food for her. What do you think?

Part of the deal of having an au pair is providing their food. I'd say that if you are unable to cook for her, then you should definitely give her the extra money, but I don't see any problem with her going to the shops herself.

Our first au pair was very picky about food (so had her own sent from Poland), and she was clueless about food hygiene, leaving food uncovered in the fridge (one of my pet hates, but I suspect she cottoned onto this and did it to annoy me).

We toyed with the idea of buying her one of those little mini-fridges for her own room, but fired her instead. I would do this before allocating her a whole shelf of your own fridge (it could get incovenient for you). Other option is to get one or two big tupperware containers to store her things in. But do you really think you need to segregate the food - after all, you are paying for it so it is still your food, even if you have no plans to eat it yourself.

Thanks Ameriscot
I was proposing segregating the food so that she didn't eat my stuff. It sounds petty but it is a real struggle ensuring food is in for my toddler and non mouldy bread for DP breakfast. So if AP ate the bananas reserved for DD breakfast it would be a disaster.

How much money do you think I should give her a week for food?

LasVegas - I had an au-pair who constantly ate all my diet stuff that I bought to take to work. Like Ameriscot I think she did it deliberately too.

The tuppaware box suggestion works well but use it for you! i.e put anything you dont want used in it and tell her that the contents of the box are not to be touched. You then can feel justified in reading the riot act if she does. As regards housekeeping money if she is buying absolutely everything, i.e. milk butter sugar etc., maybe £30 a week. It does rather up the budget however.

The box in the fridge - good idea, makes the message clear.

I should have though of that instead of moaning about it. Our first AP use to seek out food that was decretly hidden, she used to take all the fruit that was tucked away in the salad section reserved for make baby food with. The same fruit was in a bowl of the kitchen table!!

she even found 2 weeks supply tins of slim fast shakes that I abondoned( in disgust after a panic diet before hols) and put on top shelve and forgotton about it. I kept noticing them in the bin she must have been having 2 or 3 a day. She them complained of constant wind ( also noted by the kids)

I hear this complaint again and again about au-pairs. I am coming to the conclusion that a great number of them are terrified of being hard done by, even when the intention is not there at all.

I think it probably depends on the situation the girl has come from. A lot of au pairs are not used to abundance, and so they make the most of it.

Thanks dizzydo the box is a great idea.

An incident happen today that made me think about security - like cold callers, so called electric meter readers. One called today, and AP was just about to let him in the house when I pulled up drive and made an excuse and left quickly. I have reported the incident.

no sex with the man of the house

or any man in the living room, kitchen or... in the house.

What about the woman of the house?

Regarding Status: I think most aupairs also tend to read the message board on nannyjob then decide to put themselves in the same league as professional nannies (apologies in advance to professional nannies from overseas)instead of being an aupair or person from overseas, therefore some think they are being hard done by!

Please don't shoot me down with my now comment... most families I believe who engage an aupair etc are usually on a different budget to the families who would only employ professioanl childcarers/nannies etc (of course the with exceptions of parents with older children moving on from the professional nanny to another form of child carer).

So of course all the extras of having someone in your home & the expectations & more from certain people are expensive.(hidden costs as per individual/s).

Even if you think everyone is happy...then the basic chitchat from outside/comparing..& we all know there is always one who is getting more (not saying that, that person isn't worth their weight on gold) the less able ones etc still want all the perks!

Yes, there are families differ in terms of budgets and some families don't need the level of support and experience a nanny can offer.

I also found that some AP do describe themself as a nanny ( after recently do an AD on nannyjob) and some are very disapointed when they realize there was little childcare involved, only afterschool supervision, and lots of ironing and bits of housework and of course there is the 'pocket money' rather than nanny salaries.

Lots of APs describe themselves as 'nanny' to get a higher salary.

They don't really understand, or pretend not to understand that being a nanny should mean qualifications and significant experience. All they are looking at is the pound/dollar sign.

As far as they are concerned, if they have looked after children before - in whatever capacity - occassional babysitting, or watching the kids while mum/dad is in the house, that qualifies them to be a nanny!

Frankly, if any family wants to pay an AP a nanny salary more fool them.................

Food in box - what a good idea!

Ameriscot - agree with you. Think a lot of these girls come from quite poor homes and don't have access to lots of food choices.

The most irritating thing for me was their habit of eating nearly everything in a box/jar/packet, but leaving a tiny, tiny bit. So when you look in cupboard/fridge you think great, I don't need to buy, chocs, cerial, jam, milk, cheese, cream or whatever, because the packet/jar/pot is there.

It's only when you want some you find a single choc in the box, or a few pinches of cerial or a smudge of jam left. Never enough for a whole portion, or cup of tea, or sandwich, or whatever.

I think it is a ploy so you somehow won't notice what they have devoured?

Some also had nasty habit of saying they were not hungry and did not want to eat cooked meal with family in the evenings - but demolished our supply of bread/cold meats/cheese/youghuts/cakes - in their room, instead.

Every single one of my APs left significantly heavier than when they arrived.

I once bought 3 catering packs of Philadelphia cheese to make cheesecakes for 150. When I got round to making them, I discovered that one of the cartons had a smear of cream cheese left in it, so it was a quick dash to Sainsbury's to buy small containers at an exorbitant price.

You would think that 3 jumbo containers of anything meant that I had something in mind for them and it would have been easy to ask in order to clarify. Nope - I said that the au pair was welcome to anything food in the kitchen, so she thought she would pig out on it. My bad!

As far as leaving empty packaging behind, my 13 and 11 year olds (and 42-year old, come to think of it) are experts at that.