We are flying to Florida for 4 nights/5 days for a wedding. We are bringing our 6 y.o. and 3 y.o. and have decided to bring a sitter for a variety of reasons. We are paying for her flight, food and place to stay. We are trying to figure out what to pay her. She will probably be doing around 20 hours of babysitting when we will be involved in wedding activities. (A portion of that will be sleep time) she will have a good chunk of free time and the rest of the time she would just help us out while we are around. She has said to just pay her what we think is fair. We pay her $10-12 per hour for regular babysitting. We really like her so want to be generous but reasonable and have no idea how to figure this out. Does anyone have experience traveling with a sitter or have suggestions as to what would be a reasonable fee?
Thanks
I would set an amount for the whole trip. I am a baby-sitter myself, and I wouldn't want too much money, I would think the trip itself would be pretty fun.
The other ladies and I are on the same page. I was going to say $50.00 a day flat fee. My teenage daughters babysit and sometimes spend the weekend with the folks they babysit for and that is approximately what they make. They normally get paid $8.00 an hour if babysitting the three year old, and if the baby is home, it's $10.00. Since you will be taking care of expenses this should be fair. My eldest babysat for family friends for a week in their home during a school break last summer and made $200.00 plus clothes......The mom doesn't have any girls and she wanted to shop with her, lol.....
M.
I also think a flat rate would be good. Maybe $200 for the whole time. It doesn't say how old she is. A teenager would love a trip like this and the money is just extra on top. Something to keep in mind though is while she will have "free" time she will be dependent on you to get her back and forth to places. So in addition to payment maybe make sure and offer her a ride to the mall or whatever so she can do something fun also. and yes taking a sitter is a really good idea.
I would stick with a flat rate like $200 for the five days. That gives her an all expense paid trip with enough money to spend on doing her own thing when she has some free time, plus she'll have a little cash to bring home at the end.
Another place to check for advice would be on a Nanny/aupair site. It's the same kind of deal, they get a place to stay and food so they get just a little stipend on top. Find out what a live in nanny makes in a week and go from there (I'd probably cut it down a bit though since she'll have some free time and won't be required to do any housework since the hotel will do that).
HTH
T.
When I did this for 2 families while I was in College & HS ( they were my regular sitting jobs) I got $200 a week. This I think would be fair and just work out what you expect from her.
I would say cut it down to 6 or 8, then maybe buy her a souvenir or something special. You could also just tell her a certain amount for the trip, such as $200. That way if you want her to watch the children in a pinch, you've got a sitter.
