Two Nanny Questions Here
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Anonymous
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1). Yesterday morning, Monday I received a text from our nanny. Apparently there had been a water main break on her street and the water was shut off when she woke up. She told me she couldn't come in because she couldn't take a shower first. I told her it was okay, she could shower at our home, but she politely declined saying she wouldn't feel comfortable doing so.
I work from home, yet I had a lot of work to catch up on from last week and this put me out. Sure, she could have lied and told me she was sick, at least she was being honest. Still...I find this a flimsy excuse. I watched the news and indeed her street had a pipe burst, however the news said water service was restored by 11AM. (She was due to start work @7:30AM). We have employed her for about eight mos., this is her first time cancelling on us. 2). This is totally unrelated and probably is nothing, but over the weekend she Facebook friend requested my husband, and not me. I am positive nothing is going on between them, yet I find it a little odd that she would friend him and not me as well. FYI, I am listed in his friend list so she could have looked for me and found me. Advice? 
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Anonymous
| Long-time nanny here. I've had water service shut off when they worked on a water main unexpectedly. I wasn't comfortable doing it, but yes, I did go to work and shower there. Perhaps she thinks that since you work at home, it's not a big deal to take the day off at the last minute. |
Anonymous
| I am the long-time nanny pp above. I would not put ANY stock in the FB friend thing with your husband and not you (yet). FB probably had a suggested friends thing pop up, and he was there, and she clicked okay, and moved on to what she was doing to start with. She may not have had time to go through the process of finding you in his friends and then sending one to you. It probably was a split second thing that she just answered in the moment. |
Anonymous
Or she could have been looking you guys up and was on your husbands profile looking at things and accidentally friended him without realizing it. A friend of a friend recently did that to me. No bIg deal |
Anonymous
I've been a nanny to a work at home mom (and I use the word work loosely) and can confirm I'm sure you can take off without much cause for concern so I would probably have done the same thing. It's actually amazing she hasn't taken more days off. |
Anonymous
| Sometimes I don't shower the entire weekend if I don't go out and have a nice clean scrub on Monday morning. I'm super gross before I do it though and I would loathe to anyone see me. |
Anonymous
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Long-time nanny here again. I don't know that you can judge what should/shouldn't make someone uncomfortable. Some people would be mortified to take a shower at work, others wouldn't even think twice about it (I'm somewhere in the middle). Consequently, I don't know that it should be called a "flimsy excuse" on her part.
It is fair, however, that if you think her perception of your work is askew, to say something. Just explain to her what your work is like, and that there is a significant impact if you can't work one day because she is gone. Be very sure to say that you know sudden illnesses and things will come up. Make sure she knows you understand that. You don't want her feeling like she can't be sick or have emergencies. You can also request that if something like this happens again (not necessarily water main, but other non-sick emergency), once the situation resolves, even her coming in for a half day would be very helpful. All that is fair to say, as long as you don't come off as sounding like she's not allowed to be sick or have emergencies. |
Anonymous
| OP, this would really not be ok with me. It's not a requirement to shower before the job, I presume, it's just a comfort thing. I've had a water main break before my job, and I put my hair in a pony tail, sprayed on some dry shampoo, and went to work. A bit grumpily, sure, but that's not an excuse. Particularly if the main went back on by 11am, she should have come in by noon if that was truly her excuse. |
nannydebsays
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As a nanny, I think a lot of times nannies need a "mental health break" day, but feel REALLY uncomfortable asking for one, and that's where the this sort of issue comes from. We try to tough it out until we just cannot face work one day, and we call out last minute. That is actually a LOT more of an issue for our employers than our just taking some PTO! I would talk with nanny and ask her to simply come in "as is" if another water line issue takes place, and emphasize that you truly need her to work when scheduled, unless she is ill. Then ask her if she would like to schedule a long weekend soon, and remind her of how much notice she needs to give you to use some of her PTO. Facebook - I think being friends with employers/employees on FB is a HUGE mistake. It opens too many doors that should stay shut in order to maintain a professional working relationship. I highly doubt your nanny is carrying on with your DH, but I would ask your DH to "unfriend" nanny and let nanny know that your policy is to respect her privacy while she works for you. |
Anonymous
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Facebook: could totally have been an accident. I have "friended" people before when I KNOW I didn't do it intentionally (or realize it happened at all until they accepted the request.) I think sometimes my phone just does random things. Recently it activated three all day bus tickets on my city's transit app.
Shower: what is wrong with you people who can't function w/o a shower every.single.day? Seriously, what are you doing that you're so filthy and disgusting that you have to waste water every day even though huge swaths of this nation is in major drought mode? Every other day is plenty. Use a wash cloth on your pits and crotch if you really need to. I'd be annoyed if I were you OP and I'd give a formal warning. Honestly, it sounds like she just wanted or "needed" a day off and used the shower as an excuse. It's totally fine to take a mental health day, but crimony, schedule it! |
Anonymous
No big deal and no big deal. |
Anonymous
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I wouldn't want to go to work if I couldn't take my daily shower. It would just bother me and distract me too much. Also, taking a shower at my boss's home would really feel too weird, a little too close for comfort there.
If your nanny is usually reliable, then I would give her a break. If this happened on a regular basis, I would let her go...But this sounds like an isolated incident to me. I am sure she is not the first person to skip out of work due to not being able to shower in the morning. Also, I live in CA where we are in a severe drought, however I still believe everyone should shower every day, preferably in the morning. It's healthy physically and mentally too. It doesn't have to be a half hour shower, it could be ten minutes even. Shoot, even some prison inmates get to shower daily. |
Anonymous
| I take a 5 minute shower every day when I'm going to be working, but sometimes craziness happens when I'm not scheduled, so yes, I would want a shower before working (but my work is not Mon-Fri, and I work with kids who need to be out of the house every day). On the other hand, I've run into this type of issue before (also, frozen pipes) so I have a few milk jugs which I fill with water once a month, that way I have water to at least wash and flush the toilet. |