We used Bright Horizons a couple of months ago, and I was not told that rule. In fact, I thought the long questionnaire asked whether I needed driving? I just don't remember. We did not have the nanny (who was quite good) drive our kids, as she wasn't that familiar with the area, and I was fortunate to work out a carpool arrangement for the weeks in need. The temp nanny walked our kids to the library/park/friends' houses. These places are all probably within 15-20 minutes, but she never mentioned it to me, nor did the agency. In fact, I had been planning on having the nanny pick up my DC from preschool (a 20+minute walk), but it was so cold out that I asked a mom to drop him off.

I don't think there is a need to hire someone specifically to drive your child. I'd talk with other parents/nannies at the school and see if one of them could drive your child home for that time period. You could reciprocate by picking up their child and/or offering a few free hours of babysitting (we did this for a mom -- she took our son home a few days in exchange for an afternoon to herself).

I'm always willing to help out another family when I can, as I've been there.

Bright Horizons staffs its back-up nanny care using three or four services. It is possible that the particular service that staffed your nanny has implemented the rule? (I am totally guessing here -- I have no idea). I would call Bright Horizons and walk through this and see if there are other options.

Insist on interviewing the nanny first. The nanny only is supposed to callI you 24 hours in advance; I insisted on a week's notice, b/c we had some unique issues/rules to go over with the nanny (e.g., no perfume, needs to like dogs/not be allergic, etc.). I'm glad I did, as the person initially assigned to us was allergic to dogs, and we have a dog. Not quite sure how that happened...As I said above, the person we ended up with was quite good, and my kids really liked her.

OP here. It does seem a little much to put the walking restriction in. I ended up cancelling the back-up care and am having my mother fly in for the time.

Anonymous wrote:

Every choice you make has trade offs, at least when it comes to child care. Haven't we seen this across the board? No MB gets everything she wants, all the time. That's the undeniable cost of delegating child care.

Wow, what a nasty response. It's not even on topic or addresses the question.

This forum has gotten so ugly. It really makes nannies look terrible.

What is so nasty about the PP stating a fact?

Yes.. Reliability issues, incase theres an accident, etc.. It's the same for CNA elderly care as well. (In many states however, not all agencies have this rule.)

Every choice you make has trade offs, at least when it comes to child care. Haven't we seen this across the board? No MB gets everything she wants, all the time. That's the undeniable cost of delegating child care.

Wow, what a nasty response. It's not even on topic or addresses the question.

This forum has gotten so ugly. It really makes nannies look terrible.

"People are frickin rude!"

did a post get deleted? I am not understanding where all the defense of OP is coming from - who was excessively snarky??

Anonymous wrote:There were 2 snarky posts people, breath. There have been more posts about how rude the posts were.

Thanks for your "helpful" contribution to the thread!

There were 2 snarky posts people, breath. There have been more posts about how rude the posts were.