Advice needed: Nanny demands escalating

[Squidgydoodah]

First time parent here needing advice since I know very few other parents:

my nanny is lovely with my little one but over the last few months I have seen more and more demands for more hours (she is part time working 3.5 days a week and doing other stuff) and I have given her a few more hours (we are a one income household waiting to see if the other can get a job soon so we kind of need to ensure we have childcare and too scared to send our baby off to nursery still because of COVID) and we don't have unlimited funds...

but now the demands keep increasing including asking if we can change hours to suit her and to compress them into longer days but less days which really doesn't work for us - every week or two now it feels like there are new demands

I am getting uncomfortable because our baby is a fantastic sleeper and almost half the time he is asleep whilst she is here and he is really good natured and we treat her really well with nice food, chats, etc plus there is quite a lot of holiday pay she will be getting too.

But I don't know if this is normal behavior or not or if I should really just find a nursery to start in a few months? Nurseries in my area are really oversubscribed so I have to debate if I should just try to suck it up and pay her even more for a few months to keep her happy... and that she keeps my baby happy too.

Would be grateful for some perspectives and advice

She is demanding for asking? If she is asking then just say no we can’t do that.

Just say no. Nannies are the most expensive form of childcare and often appointed for convenience. You are her employer therefore you get to say what she does, not the other way around (the only exception being holidays which you usually choose 50/50). But be careful because as an employee she has rights. From what you have said it’s sounds like you have employed her for x hours over y days. If she can no longer do that and there isn’t an agreeable alternative, then she needs to resign and find another job. You aren’t obliged to give her extra hours.

Ive never used that form of childcare but even I can see you need to be more assertive.

You set the hours. If she can't do it then find someone else who can.

Well. She agreed to those hours therefore she is unreasonable to ask for more work, however she probably thought she could find another job to make up a decent salary and is finding it difficult to do so. Without knowing what the hours are it's hard to say.

Is she paid via payroll i.e. has tax etc taken out, or is she paid cash, this making it more of a 'self-employed' role. If it's the latter then she actually can dictate her hours.

She will probably just end up finding a new job altogether, I couldn't afford to live on part time hours.

You presumably are her employer, so you set the hours. Obviously, be flexible and generous where you can be. But you need the hours that you need. If it isn't working for her, then she can always look for something elsewhere that is a better fit for her.

That said, I don't think I'd be in a position to be financially struggling to afford a nanny with only one parent working and still have a nanny. I and all my colleagues have had our dc in nursery from the start of COVID. I don't know about my colleagues (centrol and north London based), but certainly in our nursery there has never been a single COVID contact and we've never had to self-isolate. None of us have been a contact or had COVID and we have two dc in full time nursery and school. I would make sure you are on a waiting list for nursery (probably tricky now as you've missed the intake for September) if that would suit you better.

tell her the hours are fixed & won't change.

start looking into nursery. At least get on the waiting list. the covid risk to babies is so small as to not be worth considering.

She is actually on the payroll at the moment and accruing holiday pay and had been getting almost no work for about 6 months so she has had a lot more financial stability, good working conditions, allowing her to study at the same time.

It seems like she has generally been working for multiple employers at the same time for years as a self employed person - I think she has only been on the payroll once or twice so perhaps she would prefer to do work for a lot more people.

It starts to sound like I better sort some nursery childcare out in case - we were hoping to raise her hours if a job comes in over the next weeks but with the rising costs, lack of cover and rising demands, I am not sure that it wouldn't be safer from the dependability of childcare (even with covid) and ultimately cheaper overall to go with a nursery - providing they have a space!

Been on the waiting list since October last year for the local nursery which I actually live right next to but there has been no space!!

It was a series of unfortunate events where several jobs fell through and my partner didn't get paid for work done so we were always "just about to start" a job so we needed the security of knowing there was childcare. It is getting to the point where it is dipping into savings if she keeps escalating the demands though so we better try other nurseries and see what we can do for stability! No family nearby to help either.

Thank you everyone for your perspectives and help! Really appreciated!

we were hoping to raise her hours if a job comes in over the next weeks

This sounds like you advertised the job with base hours promising more. So the nanny has been asking for more.

So again, while I agree that she did agree to the hours you set, I can see why she'd be looking to raise her income and take on more work that sometimes clashes with your schedule. But she should just look for more regular work.

You need to be prepared to struggle with childcare if you don't think a nursery will work, as people want a job that can pay their bills.

Get rid of her. She sounds entitled.

If she's otherwise good I'd sit her down and confirm that for the foreseeable, these are the hours you can offer, and these hours are fixed.

We have a PT nanny. She's brilliant. She'll occasionally ask for time off here or there but she's usually also available at the drop of a hat if DC ill or whatever. That's really valuable.

I agree with a PP though - did you suggest to her that more hours were on the table? If so that's with you to address now.