Nanny Question: Paying while we're on vacation? (No guaranteed hours)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Can’t help but notice the OP never clarified about why nanny was needing money for the holidays, can only assume this means this nanny wasn’t paid during the holidays…wow…

Of course we paid her for the holidays, along with a very nice end of year bonus AND advancing her pay for a month (per her request) to help her pay for Christmas expenses for her family. Even a forum full of nannies couldn't object to her treatment in our house, in particular how we treated her during the holidays.

As a nanny employer, I hear you. I had to advance about $1k to our nanny for unexpected dental work. She made more than enough to support herself, but after getting paid each week, she would blow her money on luxuries like Chanel or staying at the Four Seasons. Nannies on here would probably assume I didn’t pay her enough if she couldn’t afford dental care. But she could have, she just needed to make better choices. She has more designer clothes and bags than me, and I make 4x her salary!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Can’t help but notice the OP never clarified about why nanny was needing money for the holidays, can only assume this means this nanny wasn’t paid during the holidays…wow…

Of course we paid her for the holidays, along with a very nice end of year bonus AND advancing her pay for a month (per her request) to help her pay for Christmas expenses for her family. Even a forum full of nannies couldn't object to her treatment in our house, in particular how we treated her during the holidays.

As a nanny employer, I hear you. I had to advance about $1k to our nanny for unexpected dental work. She made more than enough to support herself, but after getting paid each week, she would blow her money on luxuries like Chanel or staying at the Four Seasons. Nannies on here would probably assume I didn’t pay her enough if she couldn’t afford dental care. But she could have, she just needed to make better choices. She has more designer clothes and bags than me, and I make 4x her salary!

How do know they aren't knock offs.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If I can budget for a family vacay I can also budget to pay bills, mortgage and the staff!! This shouldn't even be a question, you ought to pay her or else she'd quit. I'm blown away that in Chicago it's consider above average $25 hourly, this was the rate of our nanny 7 years ago.

Most people in chicago pay under the table so I'm guessing this is $25 cash. The going gross rate in Chicago is around $28-32hr.

I feel like there must be nannies on this forum pushing their agenda or something. Between all of the local families that I know with nannies none of them pay as much as us (above the table, as mentioned in my OP) and a few significantly less. We opted to give out nanny more benefits than is legally required because we really like her and want to keep her.

Oh, there absolutely are, and the entitlement is mind-boggling at times.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's really simple. If you don't pay her, she will find another job. Just like if you didn't pay the daycare, they would fill your spot.

I was a nanny in Chicago for 15 years, ran an agency there for 5 years, and have had a nanny for my own kids for 6 years. It is absolutely standard and expected to offer guaranteed hours.

I mentioned in the original post that she does not have guaranteed hours. She wanted it initially but we gave her higher pay instead. Her last 2 families (combined she worked there for 12 years) did not give her guaranteed hours. I'm not sure it's "standard and expected" to have guaranteed hours, but it of course should be honored if it's in the contract. Of the (4) neighbors and classmates that also have nannies none of them offer guaranteed hours. Maybe it's regional - this is an affluent suburb of Chicago.

Based on the feedback here I'm convinced we need to pay her to keep her, which is what we'll do. Thanks everyone for the tips.

I’m in Chicago - we have guaranteed hours. I can’t imagine not - someone’s livelihood just left up to your whims? What if you decided to take 3 weeks off, suddenly they can’t pay their rent that month. I’m glad to hear you’ve decided to be a good person

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My wife and I have a nanny that we really like. She's fantastic with the kids and we want to keep her. We pay her $25/hr in the west suburbs of Chicago, 40 hours per week, plus 5 sick days and 10 paid vacation days. We pay her above the table and everything works great. Before Christmas she asked us for a small advance to help cover the holidays, which she's since paid back (through working) and things have gone without a hitch. We do not give her guaranteed hours (nothing in the contract states that we do) but we do state that her average work week will be 40 hours.

We're planning a week long vacation without the nanny. We gave her 4 weeks of notice I've assumed that she would either go unpaid or would use her accumulated vacation time for the time off, but should have been explicit. My wife disagrees and thinks we should have her come to the house and do reorganization projects or house work. The truth is that there's not enough housework to keep her busy for a full week. She has enough accumulated vacation time to cover the time we're gone, but I'm wondering if it's reasonable to ask her to use that vacation time or not.

We absolutely want to keep her, so need to plan this conversation. Based on context clues she has assumed that she will come in on the days we're gone to do projects here at our house, but we've never discussed it. This is our first family vacation since the nanny started, so I think it will set a precident for future vacations. At $25/hr that will add $200 to every day that we go on vacations in the future.

Thoughts?

Pay her or lose her. You are one cheap jerk.