Welcoming a rematch au pair? Tips or BTDT?

[Anonymous]

Our au pair decided she was too homesick and left only a few weeks after arriving to return home to her boyfriend. We finally found a candidate that we're really excited about that is in rematch. It sounds like she was in a difficult situation with a stay-at-home mom with really unclear expectations and just a general personality mismatch. Anyway, she's arriving this weekend. We've had three other overseas au pairs, but I'm wondering if anyone that welcomed a rematch au pair did anything differently? Any ways in which I should help her (and us!) shake off our bad experiences and start fresh? I'd love to hear your story of how it went with your new rematch au pair.

[Anonymous]

I have posted before that I am terrible with rematch and have had to rematch again both times I picked rematch APs. But one transition we had that was very effective and could be similar to yours is that we welcomed an extension AP who was coming from a different family.

I would say that the best advice I got from our LCC was NOT to think she knew all about au pairing for OUR family, just because she had been a successful AP her first year, but to train her just as I would someone coming from out of country. So we went through the handbook just as thoroughly, I offered to help with bank account and classes just as I would do with a newbie, and I also went out of my way to help the children adjust to her and her to adjust to the children, just as I would with someone fresh off the plane.

One thing that I worried about was whether there would be things that she had liked about her previous situation that we didn't do or weren't offering, and this did nag at me at first. It was helpful, finally, to just outright tell her that if there were these things, that I welcomed her to tell me so that I could be aware of them.... and that if it were something easy to do or get or offer, I would. She didn't in the end every ask for us to do or get anything, but this went a long way toward building explicit good will, and it also saved me from wondering and angsting over comparisons between us and her previous HF (whom she had liked but had wanted a change of location).

Good luck with your new AP!

[Anonymous]

Thanks PP! I really appreciate it. This is our first rematch, so I'm very nervous. We did select an au pair in rematch as our LCC didn't present us with any extension au pairs at all. I took my time, interviewed the heck out of the former host mom and former LCC, and had three Skype conversations with the rematch au pair too. I'm feeling good about her. Fingers crossed!

[Anonymous]

NP here. Like 10:11 I've been more successful in rematch than in regular matches! Frankly, it's a lot easier. They know the US, they know what they are getting into and they have affirmed for themselves that this is what they want to do.
She'll have been driving etc.

Is she coming from the same cluster or from further afield? The only thing to worry about if she's coming from far away is that she'll need to make new friends. But that's no biggie!

[Anonymous]

I'm concerned about the family who took on my former au pair. No one contacted me during the rematch process and when they came to pick her up from my house, I heard them asking if she was ok with certain things, to which she replied "yes," even though those were some of the problems we had with her (i.e. staying by herself at night...she got scared). She also mentioned they were giving her a car and I purposefully didn't give her driving privileges because she was not good behind the wheel...and they live downtown! Much more complicated driving situation!

I get the feeling they are completely in the dark about why she rematched. If I was getting a rematched au pair, I would insist on speaking to the host family. It seems that both the au pair and the company left out a lot of info.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm concerned about the family who took on my former au pair. No one contacted me during the rematch process and when they came to pick her up from my house, I heard them asking if she was ok with certain things, to which she replied "yes," even though those were some of the problems we had with her (i.e. staying by herself at night...she got scared). She also mentioned they were giving her a car and I purposefully didn't give her driving privileges because she was not good behind the wheel...and they live downtown! Much more complicated driving situation!

I get the feeling they are completely in the dark about why she rematched. If I was getting a rematched au pair, I would insist on speaking to the host family. It seems that both the au pair and the company left out a lot of info.

I'm the OP and this does sound really bad I would insist on talking to the LCC and the former host parents of any rematch au pair (both of which I did).

[Anonymous]

Any more experiences with rematch au pairs to share?

[Anonymous]

OP here. Our rematch au pair arrived and it's going really well. The "start-up" was easy since she already had her license and SSN and had been driving in the US for a few months. She settled right in, has made contact with au pairs in the area, and has done wonderfully with the kids.

For our part, I think we've done a really good job letting go of the mistakes of our last au pair and really starting fresh with this one. My younger child is having a little difficulty bonding with her, but I think it will improve over time.

Hoping to keep on this track!

[Anonymous]

If you pick a candidate from the rematch pool, is it cheaper than if you get one that's overseas?