Nanny issues

ebp913

I'm getting a little frustrated with our nanny but I want to treat her fairly and I'd like some feedback.  She is great with my kids and is very patient with my son who is more than a handful.  We like her and there really aren't many issues with the care she is providing.  Where we are running into problems is that she has been out sick a lot.  Like 10+ days in the past 9 months and 3 days alone in January.  We sat down with her today to talk about it and just say that we wanted her to make us aware as soon as possible of any potential sick days.  She usually calls at like 7:30 and she is supposed to be at our house at 8:30.  I understand that people get sick and I'm sorry that she's had a rough time recently but it puts our family in such a jam, either trying to find someone last minute or missing work. She was VERY defensive about the sick days thing and was saying how her daughter and grand kids come first and she has to be there for them.  Her daughter, I understand that but the grand kids?  I feel she shouldn't be missing work to watch her grand kids.  I found the whole conversation incredibly off putting.  At one point, she was crying and my husband nicely tried to engage her and she literally refused to speak.  It was so bizarre.  She has some things (besides sick days) going on in her personal life but she doesn't talk to us about them or ask anything of us when we offer to help. We even offered her a week off to help her out but she refused.  

I'm looking for some new options.  I'm really annoyed by her defensiveness and feel like she's making it really hard for me to feel like I can provide constructive criticism.  Obviously that's just all around bad.  Do I need a better reason to fire her?  I feel bad because we do like her and she does a great job with the kids but all the drama in her personal life is effecting us now too and it's not a great situation.  I need a reliable child care provider.  

PSU_Texan

Reliability is so important.  It's a big red flag for me that she's prioritizing daughter (presumably grown?) and grandkids over her job.  I also don't like defensiveness.  What happens when you need to critique something that pertains to the childcare directly?  I would start searching for someone new. 

emberlee3

We had sick days in our nanny's contract. We also had a clause re any party terminating the contract for any reason with 30 days notice. I would not be able to keep a nanny who is that unreliable. I wouldn't fire her, but I would give her the agreed upon notice and look for someone else.

tarynh75

Sorry, but I find a sick day a month excessive. Are you sick that often? I'm not. If she has bigger priorities, then I would find someone who made their job their biggest priority.

MamaAllison

milkergirl1 said:

While I don't think you need a better reason to fire her, I don't think you should be asking about her personal life if she doesn't want to share.  Imagine if you had something personal going on and your boss was constantly asking you about it, but you didn't want to share.  But because it's affecting her work, that is a reason to let her go, as long as her days off are excessive.  She's missed just over 1 day a month, which doesn't seem too excessive, but did you have something written out in your agreement about sick days?   

Eh- if they were trying to help I think it's ok. I've cried on an employers shoulder a time or two, and I know my mom helps her house cleaner out financially every now and then. It just depends on the relationship. Obviously don't force anything!!

mae0111

Honestly, her reaction sounds very similar to that of our first nanny, when we tried to have a similar conversation.  After she'd taken 2 weeks MORE than her paid 3 weeks PTO (2 weeks vacation, 1 week sick), she didn't get a great raise, and we told her why.  She was very defensive, and quite honestly, angry that we didn't offer to pay her for the other 2 weeks.  She ended up leaving on very bad terms with no severance (she quit).

I think you're being more than fair.  You tried to have a conversation, and she shut it down.  If I were in your shoes, I'd be looking for someone else as well.

ebp913

Thanks for the advice ladies.  I am going to start looking for someone new and see what I can find. Her daughter is in Junior High so I get that she has to put her first.  It's just her lack of claiming any responsibility at all for all the sick days, etc.  Not even saying like, I know I've been sick a lot but this has been a rough few months and I hope once the winter is over things will be better.  Nothing like that!  All she said was, my family comes first.  To which I am thinking, okay that's fine but you've been calling in sick because YOU are sick.  

10 days in 9 months seems excessive to me. Most employers I know give people 3-5 days per year.  We agreed originally on 10 days a year for either sick or PTO but she never takes PTO and it's always last minute sick time which is SO much worse for us.  So technically she's within our agreement but I never imagined she would be out so much for sick time.  

What really just gets me is her attitude towards our feedback.  If we can't communicate our issues with you, that is a problem.  My husband thinks it's not fair to fire her now since we are just now addressing this.  If things continue to come up, we will be more justified since we have let her know we aren't okay with what is going on.  I would fire her now personally but I'm more impulsive and more pissed off that DH is.  

ebp913

Well things got better and her attitude and communicated improved but she's out sick again today. This is day #4 of THIS YEAR.  Thankfully my mom is in town but this is getting ridiculous.  We are going to talk to her about sick days being unpaid and see if that changes things.  If not, we will let her go and find someone new.  I need a reliable and healthy childcare provider.  

SunAndRain

Actually, I think that might be a good compromise!  PTO with >2 (or something) days notice is paid but any days missed with less than 2 days notice are unpaid.  Maybe that'll motivate her to be more reliable!  But then, I agree with others.  I'd look elsewhere. 

Either that or communicate to her that she is on probation for the next 90 days...  But honestly I wouldn't want a disgruntled employee watching my kid

ebp913

SunAndRain said:

Actually, I think that might be a good compromise!  PTO with >2 (or something) days notice is paid but any days missed with less than 2 days notice are unpaid.  Maybe that'll motivate her to be more reliable!  But then, I agree with others.  I'd look elsewhere. 

Either that or communicate to her that she is on probation for the next 90 days...  But honestly I wouldn't want a disgruntled employee watching my kid

Yea I don't either. I've already met with 1 potential candidate and am hoping to meet with a few more.  Since I'm not worried about the care of our kids and I want to find a great nanny, I'm willing to deal with the absences while we look for someone new.  I can't fire her til I have something else lined up. Ugh. 

CourtandNate said:

Wow you and your DH are surely patient.  I can't say I would be (and neither would my employer for always missing work for lack of childcare!)

 

I hope everything works out!

I am ready to let her go, my husband is being more patient which is weird because normally he is far less patient than I am. I think he feels that as the employer, we needed to address our concerns and see improvement, which we did.  In her defense, she texted me in the middle of night to let me know that she wasn't feeling well.  I can tell she's making an effort to communicate better but still, the sheer number of sick days is just too much.   We'll see.  We are going to talk to her again about it on Monday and see what she says.  

ebp913

We decided to talk to her next week and say that all days off without at least 48 hours notice will be unpaid and then we'll see if that changes things. If not and she's still out sick, we get a new nanny. I feel bad that she's sick but obviously I can't have unreliable childcare either.