nanny running out of sick days

[Anonymous]

Our full-time nanny gets a week of paid sick leave per year. She's gone through three out of five sick days and has half a year left before her anniversary. She recently developed a health issue that will necessitate doctor's appointments that will more than likely use up her sick leave and then some. She doesn't abuse her sick leave and has used up her two weeks' vacation. I'm not sure what to do and would like to hear from other employers who've been in a similar situation. TIA.

[Anonymous]

If she was in an office situation, at least my employers in the past (at the office) have been willing to work with employees to do some sort of leave without pay set up, and usually there's disability insurance that kicks in after 2 weeks out. I doubt she has any sort of disability, but I believe standard disability pay is something like 60% of your salary. I'd look into doing some sort of pro-rated pay or leave without pay, depending on what you think she needs/has earned.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If she was in an office situation, at least my employers in the past (at the office) have been willing to work with employees to do some sort of leave without pay set up, and usually there's disability insurance that kicks in after 2 weeks out. I doubt she has any sort of disability, but I believe standard disability pay is something like 60% of your salary. I'd look into doing some sort of pro-rated pay or leave without pay, depending on what you think she needs/has earned.

This is for salaried workers who have disability benefits. Salaried workers get told what the disability benefit is before starting the job just like Holidays are negotiated for nannies. By no means are you obligated to pay 60% of her salary to cover disability. It's not expected, it's not standard and actually is unheard of for hourly workers to get this benefit.

What you can do is offer as much flexibility as possible so she can work different hours to make her doctor's appt. If she cannot come in, she will have to take unpaid leave after her paid leave runs out. You deal with not having her help as much as you can.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If she was in an office situation, at least my employers in the past (at the office) have been willing to work with employees to do some sort of leave without pay set up, and usually there's disability insurance that kicks in after 2 weeks out. I doubt she has any sort of disability, but I believe standard disability pay is something like 60% of your salary. I'd look into doing some sort of pro-rated pay or leave without pay, depending on what you think she needs/has earned.

This is for salaried workers who have disability benefits. Salaried workers get told what the disability benefit is before starting the job just like Holidays are negotiated for nannies. By no means are you obligated to pay 60% of her salary to cover disability. It's not expected, it's not standard and actually is unheard of for hourly workers to get this benefit.

What you can do is offer as much flexibility as possible so she can work different hours to make her doctor's appt. If she cannot come in, she will have to take unpaid leave after her paid leave runs out. You deal with not having her help as much as you can.

Disability pay is something that is offered in the "offer package" to salaried office workers. (The offer package is salary amount, benefits, holidays, etc.). It is provided by either the employee or the employer purchasing disability insurance through an insurance company, in advance, just like any other insurance. Sometimes the employer pays all or part of this insurance premium when the employee begins working. Sometimes the employee pays for this insurance out of their paycheck to have this benefit, just in case. In no case does an employer just start paying 60% of an employee's paycheck out of company money just because someone got sick and ran out of their sick leave. Once you use up your sick leave, you know if you have insurance to cover disability or not because either you paid for it or your employer is paying for it. If you have it, as it is the case for some lucky office workers, then good. If you do not have disability insurance then you are out of luck and you have to use unpaid leave, if your employer is nice enough to deal with you not being able to come in.

I do not want nannies out there thinking once they use up all their sick leave, they can get MB to pay for 60% of their usual pay. Disability pay is not part of the usual benefits package for hourly workers.

[Anonymous]

11:40, I agree with your bottom line advice but you should know that disability benefits are not limited to salaried employees. Many hourly employees have disability benefits and need them badly: most jobs involving serious physical work are hourly, and, as a result, an injury is likely to sideline that worker for longer than a white-collar worker.

I do agree completely, though, that disability benefits are nonstandard for household employees.

[Anonymous]

i would just give her leave without pay.

and consider if you need to hire a new nanny or drop this nanny to part-time

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If she was in an office situation, at least my employers in the past (at the office) have been willing to work with employees to do some sort of leave without pay set up, and usually there's disability insurance that kicks in after 2 weeks out. I doubt she has any sort of disability, but I believe standard disability pay is something like 60% of your salary. I'd look into doing some sort of pro-rated pay or leave without pay, depending on what you think she needs/has earned.

This is for salaried workers who have disability benefits. Salaried workers get told what the disability benefit is before starting the job just like Holidays are negotiated for nannies. By no means are you obligated to pay 60% of her salary to cover disability. It's not expected, it's not standard and actually is unheard of for hourly workers to get this benefit.

What you can do is offer as much flexibility as possible so she can work different hours to make her doctor's appt. If she cannot come in, she will have to take unpaid leave after her paid leave runs out. You deal with not having her help as much as you can.

Disability pay is something that is offered in the "offer package" to salaried office workers. (The offer package is salary amount, benefits, holidays, etc.). It is provided by either the employee or the employer purchasing disability insurance through an insurance company, in advance, just like any other insurance. Sometimes the employer pays all or part of this insurance premium when the employee begins working. Sometimes the employee pays for this insurance out of their paycheck to have this benefit, just in case. In no case does an employer just start paying 60% of an employee's paycheck out of company money just because someone got sick and ran out of their sick leave. Once you use up your sick leave, you know if you have insurance to cover disability or not because either you paid for it or your employer is paying for it. If you have it, as it is the case for some lucky office workers, then good. If you do not have disability insurance then you are out of luck and you have to use unpaid leave, if your employer is nice enough to deal with you not being able to come in.

I do not want nannies out there thinking once they use up all their sick leave, they can get MB to pay for 60% of their usual pay. Disability pay is not part of the usual benefits package for hourly workers.

Who are you?

[Anonymous]

Last year our nanny had some health issues that resulted in her needing more that her contracted 5 sick days. We knew that the health issues were legit, she was not abusing sick days. We both have fairly flexible jobs, so to the extent that we could cover her absences ouselves we paid her for the extra days. There were a couple of days that we did have to hire a replacement and those days she took unpaid.

[Anonymous]

Do your nannies get 5 days sick and two wk vacation?
Thx!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Do your nannies get 5 days sick and two wk vacation?
Thx!

Nanny here. I receive 2 weeks vacation (of my choosing) and 5 sick days as part of my compensation package. In all my years of nannying I don't think I have ever used all my sick days, but it's nice to know they are there. I have been at my current job for 3 1/2 years and only used 1 1/2 sick days.

[Anonymous]

My nanny ran out of her 5 sick days last year and wanted two more so I offered to let her stay late a night or two or work on the weekend of her choosing to make up the hours.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Do your nannies get 5 days sick and two wk vacation?
Thx!

I am 21:03 - our nanny gets 5 sick days and 2 week of vacation (one her choosing, one our choosing). When our nanny needed additional sick days last year, it was because she had unexpected health issues late in the year after she had already used the vacation week of her choosing. If she had had vacation days left at the time, I would have expected her to use those days before giving her extra paid sick days.

[Anonymous]

Our nanny caught a bad case of strep towards the end of her vacation and quickly went through the five days of sick leave she had for the year. Since she had been with us for several years, we allowed her to use vacation days for that year which had not been accrued yet. We would not have done this for a new nanny.