AP recruiting - taking up foreign references

[HarrietTheSpy]

We're recruiting number two. My French isn't robust enough to speak to her referees. What are the downsides of letting someone else do this on my behalf? I have warned the candidate that it won't be me because of the language barrier. She doesn't seem to mind about that. But I'm wondering if the referees could find it weird?

Has anyone done this? I think it's better than not taking up references verbally at all.

It shouldn't be a problem. I run an au pair agency and we employ professional translators to talk at reasonable length to the referees. This has never proved a problem. However, if you don't feel comfortable doing this, many au pair agencies are willing to do the reference checking for you, how much they charge will vary by agency, by nationality and whether a CRB check has to be undertaken. Good luck.

We have written references. But I always cross check these.

I have had a family member who is fluent (rather than my dodgy GCSE level) check our au pair's references, but I thought of them as more of a 'check the reference is real' than as a way to get more information. I asked him to a) check the au pair had been employed there and that the dates matched with her info, b) ask if they had any problems that they could recall.

Who will it be? And what are you looking to find put from the reference?

If you trust that person, you just want to verify some info and it's simple objective questions I don't see any downsides. If you want more subjective answers then you would need to make sure that as well as trusting the person they either send you a transcript of what was said or know exactly what answers you're looking for.

Even though agencies will check refs they may not always ask what you are after.

I'll do it for you for free (it won't cost me anything to call as am in France) and ask lots of probing questions You can easily check I am who I say I am and I've done it for people before.

Or could you cope with yes/no answers to a list of translated questions?

Frakkin
Thank you so much for your message! I would be delighted if you could do this, given your knowledge and experience of childcare as well...shall I CAT you? Most of my fluent French speaking friends are work colleagues who don't even have children let alone have haven't been nanny or au pair employers before!! So, it was starting to look a bit tricky.

Let me know if it's okay to CAT.x

Sure. CAT away!

Hi we have used my DH business colleagues who were fluent in the language required. I just explained to the prospective AP who was calling and then email x a list of questions. It's worked out OK for us but is not as good as me getting the chance to ask myself but better than relying on written references.