AP choosing not to come on vacation

[Anonymous]

This is our first year with an AP, and I don’t know the answer to this situation! We invited AP on our annual Christmas vacation. She (very nicely) declined and is instead planning a trip with friends for that week. We are completely fine with this, BUT can we now count this as one of her vacation weeks, since she declined to come with us (and we would have had her work a bit during the trip)? Also, Christmas Eve and Christmas Day both fall within our travel week. Do these count as vacation days, since they are holidays when we wouldn’t be working anyway?

[Anonymous]

You invited her as if she had a choice. She chose no. This does not count as a vacation week. Its an extra week off you have given her.

[Anonymous]

Your mistake was giving her a choice. Don’t take away her vacation week, scrooge

[Anonymous]

Unfortunately if u didn’t warn her before you can’t go back. My AP is coming with us for Christmas and told her, I didn’t ask. Our handbook says they choose one week vacation and we choose the other one, if you have such rule you could select this as her week of vacation, if not leave and learn.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Your mistake was giving her a choice. Don’t take away her vacation week, scrooge

This, what would you prefer? To come with us on vacation or take your vacation week while we are on vacation.

[Anonymous]

Of she isn’t coming make her do child tasks. If she doesn’t want to do that, tell her it is a week of vacation for

[Anonymous]

What have you discussed with your AP during the marching process about vacation? I suggest you stick to it. Given all the holidays during the Christmas week and the fact that you were planning on taking her with you, it does not sound like you planned that week and your vacation week. So just stick to your original plan. If you decide to force her to take this as her vacation week, it would be punishment for not going with you. So, just be generous and gift her a couple of extra vacation days for Christmas.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Your mistake was giving her a choice. Don’t take away her vacation week, scrooge

This, what would you prefer? To come with us on vacation or take your vacation week while we are on vacation.

You were planning having her work some hours. Vacation week or the trip because we need you to work some hours.

[Anonymous]

Vacation week or stay home and do chores. Or make her come on part of the trip for when you need her to work. Tell her the optional part was when you didn't need her to work (such as the weekend).

[Anonymous]

She will not stay at your place so that's should be her vacation week.
Otherwise she could have stayed home and done a few tasks for you like cleaning up the kids bedrooms, arranging clothes, run errands and basically being a presence in your home.

But to be fair I would give her two extra days off because of Christmas that she can use later on.

[Anonymous]

I would not count this as her vacation week, it’s not worth the ‘bad vibes’ you’re likely to get by now trying to force this to be her vacation.

If you do count it as a vacation week (which again, I advise against), then only count it as 3 days of vacation vs. a full week (because of Christmas/Christmas Eve)

[Anonymous]

What does it say about vacation in your handbook? Our says 1 week of our choosing and one week of theirs.

I think its OK to have it be one of her weeks - you are giving her plenty of notice and it is pretty standard to be able to pick one of the weeks.

[Anonymous]

You can count as one of her vacation weeks. If you were planning on having her work Christmas and New Years’ Day you can count as full week or deduct (neither we or au pair are Christians so we treat as regular work day).

[Anonymous]

You gave her a choice between traveling while working and vacation. She declined to work that week - that's HER choice to use that week as vacation time. It's not a bonus week.

[Anonymous]

1) Only if you want to seem/be a horrible boss. If it was go with you or use a vacation week, that needed to be clear/discussed when the proposal was made.
2) No. She would otherwise have those days off. You can’t now count it just to be petty and spiteful (which is how you come across).

If you elect to force her into using a week of vacation, plan to play EXACTLY by the rules if you are not already doing so - no babysitting, no extra time, and no special requests of her.