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[quote=Anonymous]We are a new host family, and struggling with the lack of what we think of as common sense with our au pair

She is obviously excited to be in the US, and often asks us questions about the cultural norms here. She’s asked us a few times questions that came off as shockingly naive, but we brushed them off as something being lost in translation and her being inexperienced (she is 23yo btw). One of these questions was about whether she should get in a car with a stranger who offered to give her a ride to the train stop… We of course advised her not to do that, but many of her questions were in similar vain and we started getting concerned about her lack of judgment when she is out with our kids

one time, she was supposed to pick the kids up from school and bring them home straightaway. Both parents work but we have a camera in our living area that we check now and then. After noticing the kids were not home well after when they should be back, we started texting and calling her. She did not pick up for 2 hours, which made us panicking and calling the school, upon which we were told that the kids were picked up on time. We thought about calling the police, when we finally got connected to her, and she said she’s still near the school. At home, I asked her what happened. No clear answer was given, other than the fact that she was overwhelmed being outside with two kids and a play by play of how they were giving her a hard time.

I understand that you can sometimes get overwhelmed dealing with young kids, but what I don’t understand is not giving us a heads up about significantly being delayed or at least picking the phone up. She is relatively new with us and we can certainly be patient with her (which we have been, adjusting schedules so that she is barely working 30/hours a week when both parents are working close to 60 hours plus time spent training her and essentially treating her like a third child), but I just worry that if we can’t have confidence in just base sensibility and good judgment, how do we even entrust her with our most precious human beings? I know this is an issue with entrusting your kids with anyone not just an au pair, but we are feeling it more deeply since we are essentially locked into a one year commitment and the person is living your quarter as a pseudo family… We briefly entertained the idea of rematch - we know it’s early but is it better to cut your loss early in these situations? [/quote]

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