Nanny Basics
What is the difference between a 'nanny', and an 'au pair'?
Well, the difference between a nanny and an au pair usually isn't their duties, they're about the same. But au pairs are usually international. They are people who are coming from outside of the country, that are here on a visa to be an au pair. And those folks are going to live with you, full-time, and you're usually going to provide room and board for them. They have access to, of course, your children, your most important possession, and your car, and your house, and your bank accounts, and everything else you can think of. So having an au pair in your house can be a very, not necessarily a risky thing, but it's important to really know who you're going to have there. Now a nanny is somebody who doesn't necessarily sleep overnight. She can have her own separate residence, come over, take care of your kids while you're at work. Also can provide a lot of other things for them, their nutrition, because they're going to be cooking for them, they're going to be reading them their homework, and be working with them, depending on when mom or dad comes home. So they're going to have a huge influence on their upbringing.
Are there licensing requirements for nannies and au pairs?
Well the licensing requirements for au pairs are different. In fact there often are not any. There are work visas and there are requirements that they have to have, but they usually do not go through the same type of rigorous background review that you would if you were a nanny. A good example, California has set the way for a lot of the states. They have what is called the trust line and that is run by the Attorney General's office. So most Attorney General's offices will have what is called a trust line. So to be a nanny you are going to have to go down and get finger printed and photographed and a background investigation is going to happen. And the nannies pay for that. So most all of the nannies services make sure that all of their nannies can pass a background investigation. Oftentimes they will require them to have a certification in pediatric CPR. I would certainly not let somebody be long term around a child that does not have a current registration in pediatric CPR because kids choke. They get into problems and most of them with some basic training and experience, you can take care of. But I would not leave my child with someone that does not have that basic training.
What is the best way to find a qualified nanny?
The best way to find a qualified nanny is to have a referral from a close family friend that's used one. You really need to know somebody who has worked with this nanny before and always during the interview process you're going to want to call their previous clients, because there's some reason that they're not with that same family. Sometimes the parent and the nanny don't get along because of a variety of reasons - it could be money, it could be nutrition, it could be any number of things. But when you find a nanny, you're going to want to interview everybody that they've worked for in the past. If you have a good solid recommendation of somebody who says "I love this lady, she's the best, she really takes care of my kids" and it's somebody you trust, that's the best way to find one. You still need to verify all of her credentials and make sure during the interview process that the nanny is following all of your rules for your child.
What is the best way to find a qualified au pair?
The best way to find an au pair is to check for the largest agency had been around the longest and then to call clients of au pair agency. Now that doesn't mean you know that specific au pair, it might be somebody who hasn't come to the United States yet, somebody you don't really know, but you can get a very good feeling for the quality of au pairs that an agency is training and putting out there for your review. So even though it's the next best thing to actually knowing that au pair takes good care of kids, that agency (I wouldn't go with one that hasn't been around for at least ten years and have plenty of recommendations) if they don't want to give you information of other placements that they've done, sometimes an agency will say "well it's confidential who our clients are, we don't provide information." As soon as you hear that, hang up the phone. Anyone who's not going to provide you with a direct contact with clients of theirs is somebody you need to be really suspicious of. So to find a good au pair, I would start with agencies that: A. has been around for more than ten years B. I would look to make sure that they don't have any current complaints filed against them C. I would make sure that they're fitting in your price range because there can be a huge different variety and they'll all tell you that the reason why our au pairs are more expensive is because perhaps their language skill maybe much better than other au pairs, their educational skills maybe much better, their skills to take care of children in case there's an emergency may be better. So every au pair agency, you have to start by saying "When you want to train an au pair or find one that you are going to recommend for a family, what process do you go through?" in order to identify the right people; they should be able to tell you a very long list of qualifications that they go through. It that makes sense to you and if it feels good, your intuition usually tells you most about people, then it might be someone that might be safe around your kids.
