I am a nanny to a 3 year old boy and I have just moved here from California with his family. I have a couple of questions for you fantastic moms but first a little background. He goes to preschool Mon-Fri and I go to his home at 7:30, wake him up, get him dressed, feed him breakfast, and drop him off at school at 9:00.
I return to their home and depending on which day of the week it is I do all of the cleaning (everything), all of the laundry, meal planning, food ordering (Harris Teeter), pick up the food and prepare dinner 4 nights a week.
I also take my charge to all of his doctor and/or dentist appointments. When we lived in California I took him to all of his developmental therapy and speech therapy each once a week.
WHen I pick him up from preschool at 12:30, we go home, he takes a 3 hour nap, gets a snack, we play games or work on letters, numbers, shapes, colors, writing skills, etc. Sometimes we go out to the park weather permitting. During the summer months we would go down to the pool 3 times a week. He loves the pool.
So this is the routine Mon-Fri. Then on Sundays, I pick him up at 11:30 and take him to church with me, we usually go somewhere and have some lunch, we go to my house, he takes a nap and mommy or daddy come and pick him up around 7:00.
My questions to you wonderful, knowledgeable moms is that should a family like this be paying? I have no clue what the going rate for all of this help should cost in North Carolina. I only know California.
Anolther questions is they now only want to pay me for the hours that I actually have care of the little boy. What's with that?
Any advice or guidance you can provide would be so helpful.
Sorry this is such a long post but I really want to get to the bottom of this because my employers feel like they are overpaying me for this area and do not want to give me a raise.
Thanks Moms for any insight you may have on this subject matter..
I don't know what happened to my original post but here it is again. Hopefully a lot of you can give me some good feedback.
Are you a nanny or a babysitter? this post seems incomplete. Have no clue what your being paid though it seems like you are just watching kids a few hours a day.
If they only want to pay you for the hours that you have their son, then they can't expect you to come back to their house after dropping him at daycare to clean, do laundry, order food, or pick up food. If you're not being paid for those hours, then you can't be expected to be working during those hours. It would be illegal of them to try to make you work while the child was in daycare if they are not paying for those hours.
I don't know what the going rate is, but I do know they have to pay you for ALL the hours you work, not just the hours that you have the child.
Hi there,
What you are describing sound to me as a live-in nanny/housekeeper position or come-and-go full time 6 days a week position. Your duties are within the usual job description. When you work for a family, you work for a family, you clean, cook, go to appointments, shop, sit at the hospital bedside if someone is sick and they need you, in other words you do whatever that is that needs to be done in the house to make their life easier. So, I have no problem with your duties here and I think that if you do all that you are describing, you do your job very well.
About the pay. In this type of arrangement - the pay usually is weekly, bi-weekly or monthly, but never hourly, because your hours are very flexible, depending on the needs of the family. There should be no deductions in pay for child being in school or taking naps. Live-ins or even if you living out but have a full time responsibility like you describing are assumed to be on duty all the time and from what you are describing you are working when the child is not in the house.
That said, I am not familiar with the rates in CA or in NC and there is not enough info for me here to give you a good quote. For my area your salary can be anywhere in the range of $300- $600 for a week, depending on many other factors. Do not forget that if there is huge pool of nannies available and not many potential employers - the salary will drop, no matter what it used to be or "should" be in the area.
Also, from my standpoint, I think your job is not too bad. The child is in school half day and takes a nap, it is only one child, no heavy work around the house - this job is nice, think twice before you quit or fight over pay. There are people working out there with 3 little kids in the house, meals to cook, dogs to walk, and the poolsides to scrub while kids take a nap.
Good luck and I hope that helps.
Where is the rest of the post? Then I can give some insight to it :).
Okay! Thanks! It sounds like you should be making GOOD money. They pay you for all of the hours you work - if you're cleaning or on call or whatever. What happens if they find someone who won't work for them and then they are in a pickle?
Also - what kind of parents spend NO time with their kid??
Well if they only want to pay for for the time you are taking care of the child, stop doing all of the other things. There's no reason you should be cleaning their house. If you moved across country with them to take care of their son they should be paying you plenty...
Wow, poor kid. His parents don't seem to want him around.
You should tell them you want a weekly rate for everything you do ($600 or more, considering you only get 1 day off per week), or they can just pay you for the time you are with the child, ($10 per hour is fairly reasonable) and you will not be doing anything other than caring for the child (naps would be included - if you can't leave the house and do your own stuff, you are on the clock).
Thats my two cents . . .
