Anonymous
OP, I came on here b/c I am in the same situation as you and wanted to get some guidance on how to handle the situation, except that ours lied to us and told she was legal and we were in a real bind so we hired her right away without looking into her background very deeply. Our kids LOVE her and she is amazing, without her, we would not be able to go to work knowing that our kids are loved and well taken care of. Some of the comments here have made me feel better about my decision. Posters are absolutely right, it is a lot of risk for a family to take and she is affecting the wages of a legal person. Our budget cannot sustain having her at 40 hours a week now that our kids are starting private school in September.
We have been really stressed out since we found out that she is illegal and her whole family is too. I have posted ads for her, not mentioning her legal status, I'm leaving that up to the next family. As for pay, I'm sorry but she will have to figure something out, she took the risk to stay here illegally. We have paid $900/week as well because she also runs our household (cleaning, groceries, cooking, laundry) in addition to child care. How she will manage is not my concern anymore, its up to her and God now. I hope she saved most of what she earned from us to hold her over as she pieces together various jobs to survive, but that is the life of an illegal in this country.
My plan is to phase her out slowly from 5 days to 3 days and then 2 days. I'm doing this more for my kids and minimal disruption to my job, otherwise I would have terminated her as soon as I found out about her status. My question now is, how much notice before the drastic reduction in hours. Is one month enough?
She lied to you about her status? This means both of you filled out the I9 fraudulently? For me, this would be a firing offense.