Stipend for transportation

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Our au pair loves "her" car (our third car). I can totally see how an au pair would insist on this, especially since other au pairs have it.

But you should not yield if this does not work for you! The only reason we have a third car is because it was time for me to get a new one. As soon as the au pair leaves, we're selling it. If it doesn't make sense for you to have a third car, don't feel bad or obligated to get one! Just keep looking for an au pair who understands and appreciates public transportation - or an au pair who doesn't drive.

Is the $600 a monthly thing? Yearly thing?

A year.

Look beyond Brazilian candidates. You will find a different level of expectations.
$600/year is a little low. You may want to make it about $125/month

Agree with this. 600/year is low.

[Anonymous]

We're still figuring this out. We live in an urban area with good transportation options and we always want our AP to have access to safe transportation. Right now we provide an extra $40 to compensate for transportation.

[Anonymous]

Do not bend. Many of these au pairs can't adequately drive here in our area anyway, so expecting you to have a 3rd car for their exclusive use is inviting a HUGE liability on your family.

If you do NOT need a driver, do NOT offer car use. There are plenty of au pairs who only have a license because the agency required one to apply to the program.

[Anonymous]

Thanks for all the feedback, it was very helpful, we’ll plan to increase the stipend. Our son will need to be driven to/from kindergarten in a year and a half so we’ll plan to buy one then, that can be the au pair car also.

[Anonymous]

I did not offer a 2nd car (no way to afford it!) to any of my 3 Brazilian au pairs. They got an unlimited bus/metro allowance and i pick up from the bus or metro after dark. Never had a problem.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Our au pair loves "her" car (our third car). I can totally see how an au pair would insist on this, especially since other au pairs have it.

But you should not yield if this does not work for you! The only reason we have a third car is because it was time for me to get a new one. As soon as the au pair leaves, we're selling it. If it doesn't make sense for you to have a third car, don't feel bad or obligated to get one! Just keep looking for an au pair who understands and appreciates public transportation - or an au pair who doesn't drive.

Is the $600 a monthly thing? Yearly thing?

A year.

That's ridiculous.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Our au pair loves "her" car (our third car). I can totally see how an au pair would insist on this, especially since other au pairs have it.

But you should not yield if this does not work for you! The only reason we have a third car is because it was time for me to get a new one. As soon as the au pair leaves, we're selling it. If it doesn't make sense for you to have a third car, don't feel bad or obligated to get one! Just keep looking for an au pair who understands and appreciates public transportation - or an au pair who doesn't drive.

Is the $600 a monthly thing? Yearly thing?

A year.

Wow. That is really low.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I agree with the Au pairs. We live in MoCo, and not having a car puts the Au pair at a huge disadvantage. In my Au pairs friend group, there is only one girl who does not have her own or a shared car, and they seem to constantly try to manage making sure someone picks her up or can drop her off, etc. If I was an Au pair, it’s not something that I’d want to ‘bend’ on.

Makes sense. Related to my question though, is the stipend the correct route? I don’t have anywhere to park a third car where I live as it’s a more urban setting than MoCo.

If it’s urban, then there are plenty of buses, trains and Uber. Get the best pass.

[Anonymous]

Providing a car or a transportation stipend is not a requirement of the program. It is a nice perk to offer, if you can afford it, but if there are candidates who see it as a dealbreaker, I would look for other candidates. I know of families that do not offer any transportation stipend or car. You should keep looking until you find someone who is happy with what you are comfortable offering. If they are not happy with your offer to give them $600, just imagine what else they are not going to be happy about once they arrive.

[Anonymous]

We live in MoCo close to DC, so our au pair can walk to the metro and bus terminal in 15 minutes. We are on our sixth au pair and none of the
Have ever driven or had access to a car. We tried a metro pass with one au pair and it kept faulting, so was more of a hassle that it was worth. When our au pairs picked our kid up from school on the metro, we gave a monthly amount to cover those trips. And we always paid for transportation to classes. We have never had trouble matching and have had really nice au pairs, several of whom have stayed two years with us. Try looking at candidates from smaller countries with fewer au pairs. The au pairs from countries sending a lot do more comparing and perk shopping across the networks.

[Anonymous]

We have two cars, one primarily for the AP bc her job is largely to take our kids to and from school and activities. We are quite liberal with her use of that car for road trips or going fun places, but don't allow her to take it into big cities (ie NYC).

I have to say that a 15 minute walk to the METRO sounds fine in theory, but in January it sounds FAR and COLD. If I were a 20 year old, I would definitely chose the family that offered some car usage even if it was quite restrictive.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We live in MoCo close to DC, so our au pair can walk to the metro and bus terminal in 15 minutes. We are on our sixth au pair and none of the
Have ever driven or had access to a car. We tried a metro pass with one au pair and it kept faulting, so was more of a hassle that it was worth. When our au pairs picked our kid up from school on the metro, we gave a monthly amount to cover those trips. And we always paid for transportation to classes. We have never had trouble matching and have had really nice au pairs, several of whom have stayed two years with us. Try looking at candidates from smaller countries with fewer au pairs. The au pairs from countries sending a lot do more comparing and perk shopping across the networks.

Totally agree with the last about comparing. I feel like after a few weeks into the year, everything changed in terms of her attitude towards us because all the Brazilian au pairs compared benefits. We matched with another one from Brazil so I’m holding out hope it works out better this time as we were very upfront regarding benefits and expectations.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We live in MoCo close to DC, so our au pair can walk to the metro and bus terminal in 15 minutes. We are on our sixth au pair and none of the
Have ever driven or had access to a car. We tried a metro pass with one au pair and it kept faulting, so was more of a hassle that it was worth. When our au pairs picked our kid up from school on the metro, we gave a monthly amount to cover those trips. And we always paid for transportation to classes. We have never had trouble matching and have had really nice au pairs, several of whom have stayed two years with us. Try looking at candidates from smaller countries with fewer au pairs. The au pairs from countries sending a lot do more comparing and perk shopping across the networks.

Totally agree with the last about comparing. I feel like after a few weeks into the year, everything changed in terms of her attitude towards us because all the Brazilian au pairs compared benefits. We matched with another one from Brazil so I’m holding out hope it works out better this time as we were very upfront regarding benefits and expectations.

Honestly, we are looking for our next au pair right now and the only nationality I filtered out was Brazil. There are so many of them here so they compare their situations to each other a lot. And, they tend to be big partiers.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We have two cars, one primarily for the AP bc her job is largely to take our kids to and from school and activities. We are quite liberal with her use of that car for road trips or going fun places, but don't allow her to take it into big cities (ie NYC).

I have to say that a 15 minute walk to the METRO sounds fine in theory, but in January it sounds FAR and COLD. If I were a 20 year old, I would definitely chose the family that offered some car usage even if it was quite restrictive.

When it's their own dime (paying for gas or Uber), our AP would walk 30 minutes to the metro. They made the choice to spend that dollar on Dunkin Donuts along the walk instead.

APs will make different choices when it's "free" (to them) vs they need to invest in it (pay for their own gas).

[Anonymous]

Most employers don't pay for transportation outside of work hours. $50 a month for non-work related transportation is reasonable.