Anonymous
08/08/2019 22:24
Subject: Re:Stipend changes -
Anonymous wrote:I’m confused, are people saying that they give their AP a day off and then pay them less than the $196? I’m fairly sure that is against the rules of the program. My AP got an extra day off this week, due to my kid having a doctors appointment. However, she is still paid her full stipend. I would never pay her less because I gave her an extra day off. She also gets all major holidays off. She is paid for these days, and then she still gets her full two weeks of paid vacation.
No, that’s not what anyone is saying. The $200/week is a floor.
Anonymous
08/08/2019 22:23
Subject: Stipend changes -
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:As noted previously, everyone who says they pay minimum wage is lying unless they are paying MW based on the full 45 hours you have them at your beck and call.
Show me the law that says that’s how scheduling employees works.
Crazy. If you paid an actual full-time and decided you didn’t need her on certain days, you would still be bound to pay her a full/time salary.
Bound by what? Employers are not required to pay for on-call time, period.
Hilarious! Ask any full-time nanny, if her employer can willy-nilly change her hours and pay her less on a given week, because they feel like it, go ahead, we’ll wait. Shameless!
So it’s not the law just something you feel entitled to. Got it.
Tons of employees have to be available as they are scheduled and are not paid for “on call” time. Because it’s allowed. I get that DCUM nannies wouldn’t like it, but an employer with last-minute scheduling, who pays minimum wage, is still paying the legal minimum wage.
Anonymous
08/08/2019 22:10
Subject: Re:Stipend changes -
Anonymous wrote:I’m confused, are people saying that they give their AP a day off and then pay them less than the $196? I’m fairly sure that is against the rules of the program. My AP got an extra day off this week, due to my kid having a doctors appointment. However, she is still paid her full stipend. I would never pay her less because I gave her an extra day off. She also gets all major holidays off. She is paid for these days, and then she still gets her full two weeks of paid vacation.
I think you are very confused or perhaps non English proficient. How did you conjure up this nonsense?
Anonymous
08/08/2019 17:36
Subject: Re:Stipend changes -
I’m confused, are people saying that they give their AP a day off and then pay them less than the $196? I’m fairly sure that is against the rules of the program. My AP got an extra day off this week, due to my kid having a doctors appointment. However, she is still paid her full stipend. I would never pay her less because I gave her an extra day off. She also gets all major holidays off. She is paid for these days, and then she still gets her full two weeks of paid vacation.
Anonymous
08/08/2019 17:24
Subject: Stipend changes -
Except some people are trying to virtue-signal and say that they are employers who minimum wage. Others are pointing out that this is BS, because the virtue signalers are not actually paying minimum wage for all of the time that they have the au pair available. Pay your au pair what ever you want past the minimum, but don’t lie to yourself/others that you are compliant with minimum wage laws.
Anonymous
08/08/2019 16:17
Subject: Stipend changes -
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:As noted previously, everyone who says they pay minimum wage is lying unless they are paying MW based on the full 45 hours you have them at your beck and call.
Show me the law that says that’s how scheduling employees works.
Crazy. If you paid an actual full-time and decided you didn’t need her on certain days, you would still be bound to pay her a full/time salary.
Bound by what? Employers are not required to pay for on-call time, period.
Hilarious! Ask any full-time nanny, if her employer can willy-nilly change her hours and pay her less on a given week, because they feel like it, go ahead, we’ll wait. Shameless!
APs are not employees and HP are not employers. It's not shameless, it's the program. But if you really are a HP (and I don't think you are), YOU are free to pay whatever you feel in your heart is fair. I am 100 confident that my AP is treated fairly.
Anonymous
08/08/2019 16:10
Subject: Stipend changes -
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:As noted previously, everyone who says they pay minimum wage is lying unless they are paying MW based on the full 45 hours you have them at your beck and call.
Show me the law that says that’s how scheduling employees works.
Crazy. If you paid an actual full-time and decided you didn’t need her on certain days, you would still be bound to pay her a full/time salary.
Bound by what? Employers are not required to pay for on-call time, period.
Hilarious! Ask any full-time nanny, if her employer can willy-nilly change her hours and pay her less on a given week, because they feel like it, go ahead, we’ll wait. Shameless!
Anonymous
08/08/2019 13:23
Subject: Stipend changes -
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:As noted previously, everyone who says they pay minimum wage is lying unless they are paying MW based on the full 45 hours you have them at your beck and call.
Show me the law that says that’s how scheduling employees works.
Crazy. If you paid an actual full-time and decided you didn’t need her on certain days, you would still be bound to pay her a full/time salary.
Bound by what? Employers are not required to pay for on-call time, period.
Anonymous
08/08/2019 10:13
Subject: Re:Stipend changes -
to add one more point to my above post. I do agree with one point that was made about multiple children. I do think there are some unfair things going on with that. Personally, my AP takes care of 1 child and she has another AP friend that take care of 7 children. It is not fair that they both make the same stipend IMO. However, I am not sure what all benefits the other family provides, so maybe they make up for some of it there. However, also to my point, the AP with 7 kids went into that family knowing full well that she would be caring for 7 children and she chose to match with that family. In fact, every time I've mentioned to my AP about how much it sucks and is unfair that her friend takes care of that many kids, my AP just says, "she chose that family, so don't feel bad for her."
Anonymous
08/08/2019 09:24
Subject: Stipend changes -
Anonymous wrote:I like how some host families tend to forget that, actually, Au Pairs do pay for their room and board as it is deducted from their stipend so not actually "a gift" to the APs and that plenty of APs have to pay for their phone/gas/transportation tickets and have to pay over a thousand dollars in tax.
In many places it would probably be cheaper for the Au Pair to rent her own room in a shared flat and have another job than work as an Au pair. Not least because they would then have no curfew, have the ability to invite whoever they want and not be accountable to the people they work for outside their working hours.
The cheapest nanny rate in SF is 20$/hour which makes for 900$/week, so even if the AP had to pay for her own phone, public transportation (about 80$ for monthly muni pass) and rent (let's say a 1000$ though there is definitely cheaper), food (let's say 200 dollars per month) then she would still be way better off than being an Au Pair, if only for the peace of mind of having her own space and not having to be scrutinized by her host family.
Families who say they would be better off paying for a Nanny if they had to pay minimum wage when in places like California it would mean paying 900$ a week (for one child!) for 45hours of care seem a bit deluded.
Families who can afford an AP to work only 15hours a week with their only child definitely have APs as luxuries but families with 3 kids who require 45hours a week and then some, are having a barghain with an AP regardless of the perks the family CHOSES to gift their AP.
I doubt most families who use the program are actually in it for the cultural exchange unless they want to learn a specific language so then they also get an at-home tutor included in the 196$ which saves them $$$. It seems to me like families like to focus on the perks they offer and money they ''save'' the AP and not on how much the AP saves them.
Why begrudge the person who look after your children, a decent pay?
I like how some people forget that APs sign up to be Aps, knowing full well what their pay would be. They also should know what their HF will be paying for and what they won't be, before they match. If they find themselves in a home where they are paying for their own phone, gas, transportation, and getting treated like a child, they should talk to their LLC and rematch, or leave the program. If they don't, that is on them.
Have I seen a couple of bad host families? Yes, I have. However, by and large I see HFs that go WAY above the requirements for pay, and benefits they provide to their APs. I've also seen multiple former APs post on this forum about how their time as an AP was the greatest year(s) of their lives.
Anonymous
08/08/2019 08:51
Subject: Stipend changes -
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:As noted previously, everyone who says they pay minimum wage is lying unless they are paying MW based on the full 45 hours you have them at your beck and call.
Show me the law that says that’s how scheduling employees works.
Crazy. If you paid an actual full-time and decided you didn’t need her on certain days, you would still be bound to pay her a full/time salary.
Anonymous
08/08/2019 06:46
Subject: Re:Stipend changes -
Reminder to all, legally AP's CANNOT come to this country and work as a nanny. The scenario above for a nanny in San Francisco (and based on the cost of living in that city I very much doubt that a nanny there would have so much leftover spending money https://www.investopedia.com/articles/personal-finance/091615/how-much-money-do-you-need-live-san-francisco.asp) does not take into account that the US State Department set the AP program up as a cultural exchange to give young adults from other countries the opportunity to come live in the US for a year or 2 at most. Au Pairs are not professional child care workers doing this as a career; it is an exchange - child care work for the cultural experience of being immersed in the US. Any foreigner who signs up for the Au Pair program as a way to make money should be looking into other ways to come to this country; it is not meant as a way to gain citizenship (thus the reason some countries get dropped from the program when to many AP's overstay their visa's), it is not meant as a way to profit for the AP's (thus the setting of a stipend, not a salary), it is a chance for young adults who might not be able to afford living and traveling the country for a year on their own to come and do so. While I agree that many families sign up for the program as a way to gain childcare without fully understanding the purpose, that is more to do with the marketing by the companies (flexible, affordable childcare!); to be successful, families and AP's both need to know what they've signed up for (up to 45 hours of child care per week AND the responsibility of caring for/supporting a young adult so they can experience our country.
Anonymous
08/08/2019 05:55
Subject: Stipend changes -
I like how some host families tend to forget that, actually, Au Pairs do pay for their room and board as it is deducted from their stipend so not actually "a gift" to the APs and that plenty of APs have to pay for their phone/gas/transportation tickets and have to pay over a thousand dollars in tax.
In many places it would probably be cheaper for the Au Pair to rent her own room in a shared flat and have another job than work as an Au pair. Not least because they would then have no curfew, have the ability to invite whoever they want and not be accountable to the people they work for outside their working hours.
The cheapest nanny rate in SF is 20$/hour which makes for 900$/week, so even if the AP had to pay for her own phone, public transportation (about 80$ for monthly muni pass) and rent (let's say a 1000$ though there is definitely cheaper), food (let's say 200 dollars per month) then she would still be way better off than being an Au Pair, if only for the peace of mind of having her own space and not having to be scrutinized by her host family.
Families who say they would be better off paying for a Nanny if they had to pay minimum wage when in places like California it would mean paying 900$ a week (for one child!) for 45hours of care seem a bit deluded.
Families who can afford an AP to work only 15hours a week with their only child definitely have APs as luxuries but families with 3 kids who require 45hours a week and then some, are having a barghain with an AP regardless of the perks the family CHOSES to gift their AP.
I doubt most families who use the program are actually in it for the cultural exchange unless they want to learn a specific language so then they also get an at-home tutor included in the 196$ which saves them $$$. It seems to me like families like to focus on the perks they offer and money they ''save'' the AP and not on how much the AP saves them.
Why begrudge the person who look after your children, a decent pay?
In many places it would probably be cheaper for the Au Pair to rent her own room in a shared flat and have another job than work as an Au pair. Not least because they would then have no curfew, have the ability to invite whoever they want and not be accountable to the people they work for outside their working hours.
The cheapest nanny rate in SF is 20$/hour which makes for 900$/week, so even if the AP had to pay for her own phone, public transportation (about 80$ for monthly muni pass) and rent (let's say a 1000$ though there is definitely cheaper), food (let's say 200 dollars per month) then she would still be way better off than being an Au Pair, if only for the peace of mind of having her own space and not having to be scrutinized by her host family.
Families who say they would be better off paying for a Nanny if they had to pay minimum wage when in places like California it would mean paying 900$ a week (for one child!) for 45hours of care seem a bit deluded.
Families who can afford an AP to work only 15hours a week with their only child definitely have APs as luxuries but families with 3 kids who require 45hours a week and then some, are having a barghain with an AP regardless of the perks the family CHOSES to gift their AP.
I doubt most families who use the program are actually in it for the cultural exchange unless they want to learn a specific language so then they also get an at-home tutor included in the 196$ which saves them $$$. It seems to me like families like to focus on the perks they offer and money they ''save'' the AP and not on how much the AP saves them.
Why begrudge the person who look after your children, a decent pay?
Anonymous
08/07/2019 22:14
Subject: Stipend changes -
Anonymous wrote:As noted previously, everyone who says they pay minimum wage is lying unless they are paying MW based on the full 45 hours you have them at your beck and call.
Show me the law that says that’s how scheduling employees works.
Anonymous
08/07/2019 16:38
Subject: Stipend changes -
As noted previously, everyone who says they pay minimum wage is lying unless they are paying MW based on the full 45 hours you have them at your beck and call.