Liv Lord

Hello,
My husband and I are looking to move to Shanghai next summer with our baby who is currently 5months old. I am a Primary school teacher and my husband is an automotive manufacturing engineer. We currently live in London, UK, where we both work on average 50hr weeks. We have heard that working hours in China are very long and its a concern to us as we a have a baby and don't want to be spending many extra hours at work than we do already. We are not afraid of hard work but with a young baby, we dont want to be missing out on quality time with her or together as a family. Any information on working hours and conditions would be most appreciated. Thanks for your time, Olivia

gundammk2

In China we normally work for 8 hours everyday and 5 days every week.

Jack Awesome

Welcome to shanghai. It is actually depends on yourself that how many working hours you want. In china, your salary would be very OK for supporting the baby for a 40hours work I think. Because the food is cheaper. Shanghai is a quite shopping city and we people normally sleep very late. So that most of the business close around 8:00-9:00PM which means it may let you work over 50 hours per week. They prefer pay you monthly so that there would be a accountant to deal with the tax and avoid heaps money... Well, it is a huge city, do get lost lol. And all the best for your trip

bakedbean

Welcome to the forum, Jack

Jack Awesome

thanks just found this fascinating forum.

MonsterP

Hi Olivia,

I've lived in Shanghai previously, pre 2009, and I just moved back here.
Prices have gone up like crazy, and if you're looking for a decent, 2 bed apartment, around 100sqm, then you'll be paying the best part of 10,000-14,000 yuan a month. I just viewed 35 apartments, and only found 3 that I would put my family in.

Food, unless you're eating local noodles, and buying meat and vegetables from the very local areas, is far more expensive than UK. Especially if you want the occasional UK luxury, like a box of corn flakes, which will set you back 5 quid for 300g box.

Beer, in a standard pub, like BigBamboo, is 8 quid a pint, more if you like Guinness, for example.
I would expect your husbands company to be signing any rental contract for you, so that takes away a massive headache of debating with the landlord over paying him quarterly in advance, committing for 2 years minimum, etc.

Back to looking after your little one (I'm in the same situation with an 18 month old), if your husband will have a good job, then you won't need to be working, which will solve your issues of whether to trust an unqualified non-English speaking Nanny. If you want maybe a Filipino or Indonesian girl (popular for this job), then they'll be costing you more because of their English and other skills. However, even if you decide to stay at home, its likely that you'll be having a maid/nanny anyway.

Welcome to Asia, when you get here, its lovely, and every part has very different challenges and pleasures!

Regards, MP

1986mlob

It totally depends on your jobs. I assume you will try to teach in an International School?

I was working for EF and hours were 11-8/12-9.

I also had to teach on the weekends where it was 930-530.

I was off on Thursdays and Fridays.