How to handle lateness

[Anonymous]

Our nanny has been with us for 1.5yrs, and our 2-yr-old DS loves her. She generally does a great job taking care of him, is professional, knowledgeable, etc. BUT. She is late at least once a week- generally about 15-20 minutes, but it can range from 10-45 minutes. The issue is that she lives an hour away and commutes during rush hour, so traffic is somewhat unpredictable. Has anyone dealt with this issue, and if so, how did you handle it? Would it be appropriate to count the late periods as unpaid or vacation/sick time (although that would be annoying to track)? Or can we basically have a rule that she will work 9 hours from when she arrives at our house, rather than the set 8:30-5:30 schedule she works now?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Our nanny has been with us for 1.5yrs, and our 2-yr-old DS loves her. She generally does a great job taking care of him, is professional, knowledgeable, etc. BUT. She is late at least once a week- generally about 15-20 minutes, but it can range from 10-45 minutes. The issue is that she lives an hour away and commutes during rush hour, so traffic is somewhat unpredictable. Has anyone dealt with this issue, and if so, how did you handle it? Would it be appropriate to count the late periods as unpaid or vacation/sick time (although that would be annoying to track)? Or can we basically have a rule that she will work 9 hours from when she arrives at our house, rather than the set 8:30-5:30 schedule she works now?

I think this would be a grand idea. Talk to her about it and see if she agrees.

[Anonymous]

have you talked to her about this before? that is a lot of coming in late and very unprofessional. due to a series of moves over the past few years (both on their part and mine), I now live about 45 minutes away from my NF. I'd say I've been late a handful of times -- less than once a month -- and by late I mean ~10 minutes. Never have I shown up that late. it took some finessing after every move to figure out exactly when I needed to leave the house but now I am there between 5 and 10 minutes early every day. Traffic can be unpredictable but she should balance that by leaving her house earlier everyday. It's really not that difficult and as an MB I wouldn't find it acceptable that she is that late that often

[Anonymous]

I think the "9 hours starts when you get here" is a great idea if you have the flexibility to make it work. My guess is that she will suddenly get better at arriving on time.

[Anonymous]

Depends. Are you ever late? If so, maybe she is just giving you a taste of your own medicine

[Anonymous]

OP here- thanks, all. We have not had a formal discussion/warning, but we have told our nanny that she needs to be on time. She always apologizes when she is late (and calls/texts to let us know she's running late), so it's not like she just waltzes it when she feels like it.

Re: my lateness, I am very rarely late, and if I am late, it's generally only about 5 minutes. If I am going to be later than that, I always call her in advance and pay her overtime. I don't pay her overtime if I am 5 minutes late- but, again, it's only happened a handful of times in the past 1.5 years.

[Anonymous]

A lot depends on how flexible you are able to be and how critical the 8:30 start time is.

There is a big difference to me between 10 minutes and 45 minutes - one we can accommodate pretty easily and the other is much more of a problem.

So if it were me I would tell her I want to talk about the commuting challenges and impact on her and us. I would say that we do need coverage for the time we contracted with and pay her for (in my case that's 8-6). We understand that occasionally traffic will present a problem and 5 or 10 minutes lateness very occasionally we can certainly accommodate. We all appreciate that kind of flexibility in our workplace. But when the lateness is as regular as it's becoming that is not ok for the longterm, and anything more than 15 minutes really starts creating a significant problem for us in our workplace. Do you have any thoughts on how we might restructure things to make your arrival time more reliable?"

I would consider telling her that anything more than 15 minutes late will be unpaid time, in half hour increments. (So if she arrives at 8:50 she loses a half hour of pay.) You could also consider starting her workday 15 minutes earlier. She could use google traffic to check her commute before she leaves in the morning.

You could also incentivize on time arrival, offer some level of commuting benefit to offset the aggravation, give her a monthly bonus if she is never more than 15 minutes late, etc...

You can also say "I'm really sorry but the routine lateness is becoming a serious problem for us. I realize that the commute is a major hassle for you also. Do you think this job still makes sense for you?" And see what she does. Presumably she wasn't routinely late in the beginning?

I would not go with the "works 9 hours from whenever she arrives" approach as that basically tells her that you don't really care WHEN she arrives, just that she stays for 9 hours when she does. If that works for you, great. Or you might even just change her hours to 9-6 in that case. But otherwise you're just giving her approval to treat the 8:30 start as totally optional.

[Anonymous]

the fact that she is late regularly - about once a week - tells me that she can't get out the door in the morning, not that traffic is unpredictable. yes, traffic can be unpredictable once in a blue moon but if traffic is "unpredictable" once a week, that makes it predictable.

I agree with the PP above about anything 15+ minutes will be unpaid but I strongly disagree with incentivizing her on-time arrival. nobody gets bonuses because they show up to work on time - the point of paying her is to show up on time. if you haven't talked to her formally about this yet I would be a little more lax because she might not realize this is a problem since you have been allowing it for so long. you might just want to say that you've tried to accommodate her lateness but that is really something you can't do anymore. if the lateness continues, THEN move on to something more formal (the unpaid paid time). maybe she is just slow out the door because you have been allowing it and once you tell her it is causing you problems she will be more aware and make it in to work on time.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP here- thanks, all. We have not had a formal discussion/warning, but we have told our nanny that she needs to be on time. She always apologizes when she is late (and calls/texts to let us know she's running late), so it's not like she just waltzes it when she feels like it.

Re: my lateness, I am very rarely late, and if I am late, it's generally only about 5 minutes. If I am going to be later than that, I always call her in advance and pay her overtime. I don't pay her overtime if I am 5 minutes late- but, again, it's only happened a handful of times in the past 1.5 years.

Actually that's exactly what it sounds like she's doing. It's nice that she calls, but showing up late once a week, as much as 30-45 minutes? You are being incredibly tolerant. And she is taking advantage of that.

I suppose it depends on how big a problem this is for you, and whether she takes advantage of you in other respects. I would explain that the hours of the job are X-Y and if she cannot manage that then the job is not for her. And I would give her one more warning and explain that the next time she is late you will begin docking her pay. Many many people have long commutes to their job and are rarely, if ever, late.

I would not allow her to work 9 hours from whenever she arrives, unless you don't care at all when you get to work and get home.

[Anonymous]

We had this exact same trouble. We addressed it a couple times and would see improvement for a week or two, but it always regressed. What we finally did was move her start-time later (to when she was actually showing up) and reduce her hours. She was 15+ minutes late every single day, though.

Honestly, it sucks. I do "drop off" and DH does "pick up," so it means I have to stay later at work to get my hours in, which means I don't always make it home to tuck the kids into bed. But for whatever reason she was incapable of arriving at the scheduled start time. It was her one (OK, one of two) major flaws. And we weren't willing to take more drastic action over it.

[Anonymous]

Depends on how accomodating your work can be. I would get big side eyes for being 45 minutes late and if I'm paying for a nanny, I expect to not have to compromise my image at work due to childcare challenges, so I would not be happy with that.

But if you can just come in half an hour late but stay half an hour later to make up for it, then propose that as the path forward to your nanny - when she's late, you need to stay late at work.

[Anonymous]

Nanny here OP, just say ..... I have a new boss and I can't be late for work anymore, so I need you here at this time time....-- I live 45 minutes away from my employer and take the beltway each day. I leave 20-30 early for traffic and I arrived earlier than my start time; just stayed in my car 'till its time. It's been 5 years and I'm only late around 3 times, twice is the flood by River road, one at Old Georgetown Road, and one I overslept, didn't hear or turned off my alarm.

[Anonymous]

Wells making start time earlier help? Add half hour?

[Anonymous]

I commuted an hour in Chicago traffic for 7 months and was never late one of those days. Your nanny could do better but it sounds like for some reason she's not wanting to try. All it takes is leaving 20 minutes earlier, or whatever time she need. Really, that's it. She's not responsible.

[Anonymous]

Yeah, I agree, I lived an hour away from work for a year and always left super early to make sure I wasn't late. If I was early I read in my car, filled up my gas tank, went to a coffee shop, etc. That seems very unprofessional to me - being late from traffic should happen very rarely, like when a semi truck carrying bees overturns on the highway and it closes for hours (happened here). She may be starting to feel burned out from the length of her commute and is finding it too difficult to get up early enough to ensure she's on time. Sorry OP, doesn't sound like a great situation.