Mom’s know best, take it from one who knows!
In the pre-pandemic world, it was difficult to obtain childcare. Parents have long struggled to fill the gap between returning to work and raising a family. The feeling mom’s have around parting with their kids for even a moment brings insurmountable guilt about time spent away. Moms justify our returning to work is necessary and critical to our family’s survival, but parents need both income AND the help raising their children in a working society while they can’t be available for their children.
Now more than ever, there is a higher demand for childcare and unfortunately that demand is met by a combination of people: teachers, tutors, mentors, volunteers, students working as a ‘mothers helper’, your neighborhood friends looking for lunch money but also private entities who see a need to fill the demands of childcare and incorporating to bridge the gap. But not all of these people have your interest or the interest of your family in mind. Some, if not most, want to strictly earn a living off the backs of working parents, even if those parents have had a breakdown in their family structure and are raising their kids in a co-parenting or divided home with little financial support and often stretching beyond their means to cover the costs associated with basic care.
The reasons of your needing childcare is often met with a blank, confused stare, by the entities who exploit your needs and children for profit. Simply, put, these entities are not qualified and can’t possibly meet your expectations or demands. Stop settling and consciously DO. NOT. HIRE.
There is an expression, ‘no one will love your children the way you do’ which can be better translated to ‘no one will look after your children the way you need them to’. Is it too much to ask, or expect, to obtain adequate childcare services? Apparently, yes, it is rocket science for this industry!
Babysitter referral agencies are profiting from all the mothers who must find care to return to work and the idea of hiring an agency to furnish your family with a properly vetted out babysitter or nanny referral is cringeworthy.
Sometimes moms become desperate for help - you’re in a bind, you’ve got a meeting, a deadline, an interview, a college entrance exam, whatever the case, these agencies claim to “take the stress off your hands” when unbeknownst to most moms, they’ve just dumped all their dirty laundry into your lap for folding and you do not want those extra loads of laundry. Consequently, these loads of laundry have some serious stains you may not be able to remove and the damages are hard to remediate without exercising the utmost caution.
Moms —> your children are being exploited with very little consideration to WHOM is actually watching them and WHOM is actually liable when something goes awry.
Most babysitter / nanny referral agencies claiming to provide “nanny services” “childcare services” or are quietly operating as a “childcare provider” are grossly underregulated, unprofessional and high-risk to your family.
Why?
First, most of these “agencies” are attending college campuses and “recruiting” college aged adults who may not have experience in childcare settings but they can potentially acquire some basic skills, like CPR/AED life saving techniques. The keyword here is potential, not actual.
Most of the recruits make claims in their bios that their experience with children as childcare professional was obtained from the mere fact of being an older sister or older brother. This is remarkable.
Babysitting a younger brother or sister doesn’t provide the experience necessary to work with children as an independent contractor in a childcare setting or as a professional nanny or babysitter in someone’s private residence . This self-serving experience provides basic child care exposure in a biased setting, limited to observing ones own siblings.
CPR/AED courses are thus a dime a dozen. Most local child care community based centers provide this course for a small fee, or no charge, to individuals in the community that are participating in other programs offered. Additionally, most expire within 2 years and in my experience these qualifications are seldom checked, verified and renewed. I have had more agency-retained-sitters enter my home with expired credentials than any other child care platform available for hire. The difference, is this vetting is the sole responsibility of the sitter referral agencies.
Second, this brings me to the most important point for why you should not hire through a sitter referral agency.
Sitter referral agencies are NOT liable for ANYTHING.
YOU ARE.
Let’s call it pass-through liability because essentially that’s what it becomes without your knowledge.
You think, “I need help NOW!! Who can I call? Stacy* referred me to a sitter service, but I can’t remember the name…let’s get on face book and post maybe someone knows….”
Boom. Before you know it, you’re sucked into a sporadic babysitter service. You don’t know who owns the business? Are they reputable because you know them, personally? Or did you rely on the proprietary algorithms of g()()gle reviews, designed to give everyone 5 stars? You’ve never met any of these people.
There is no REAL rapport because it’s internet based and you have no information on who the babysitter is or what their story is; all you know is that Jane Doe will be at your house at 2pm so you can run out the door 30 minutes late to an appointment. And you don’t care because you were desperate, you needed help and someone showed up.
THIS IS THE NANNY CAN’T VORTEX.
Don’t get sucked into this cycle.
Third, when a sitter shows up at your house for a few hours, they have no loyalty to you or your family. If something happens to your child, it’s not the babysitters fault. It’s not the sitter agencies fault. There is no protection for your family.
It becomes YOUR legal liability, not theirs and everyone knows this except the parents until after something unfortunate occurs: your child is injured, your dog, whom they’re not watching, runs out the front door and gets lost, or the sitter backs into your garage door. The risk is endless and wide open.
The risk is not worth it.
The sitter agencies will attempt to circumvent the legal structure of the state by placing in their “Terms and Conditions” that a) sitters are not their employees; b) you pay the sitters directly; c) they are not liable for omissions or material misrepresentations of fact in the ‘recruitment process’; d) they make no guarantees for your sitter coverage needs e) they are ONLY responsible for referring a sitter to you and therefore not liable for the conduct of the sitters; among others. Those are the most important.
Many of the sitter agencies I see are claiming the sitters are only being referred on paper, when in reality they are most likely employees and being treated as an employee while being misclassified. There is a vast difference in how the sitters communicate back and forth between the agencies and each other over what is being documented. I can name 3 sitter agencies in the local market that are a lollipop-lick-away from having an injunction ordered by the State. It is only a matter of time before these schemes are brought to truth, and perhaps I can shed some light on why this area of the industry needs further regulation.
Four, there is no incentive for you as a hard working parent to hire a sitter who you don’t know; you have no control over their conduct or interactions with your child; they come and go as they please; can lie about their schedules and activities; while you have no influence in their pay, benefits or enrichment as your hired help. After all aren’t they there to help YOU?
In conclusion, you would be wise to direct-hire a professional and be involved in the process, not simply because you care more or less about the intricacies of your babysitters involvement in your home, but mainly for your own protection of you and your family.
You work hard for them.
You deserve that!
