brisnick

http://www.worksite.actu.asn.au/show...dff7846882ee80

Daytime rates

$40 first three hours
$10 for every hour after first three hours

Evening rates

$33 - $40 first three hours
$10 for every hour after that up to midnight
$12 for every hour after midnight

Also, FYI...

The minimum wage payable in Australia is $467.40 per week or $12.30 per hour.

thebears

Thank you all for your information on babysitting rates.

Mrs Bear

glittababe

I pay $15 p/hr - can't remember what the rates are for before and after school club. can't be that much otherwise I'd have moaned on here! I'll check with hubby.......wait for the moan.......

walaj

The only babsitting we have paid for (last month) was for a company through the hotel we were staying at in Melbourne. I would take their rates as a max to pay out:

The company is Time Out Services. The rates they charge are as follows:

Day rate (1am – 7pm) - $18 p/hour

Night rate (7pm – 1am) - $14 p/hour

$20 booking fee

$10 parking fee

Minimum 3 hours

gedge

My OH used to babysit. She is a trained and registered child care centre teacher.
The children she babysat for were from the child care centre where she worked. I'll point out that the area is wealthy and the parents are not short of a bob or two.
The going rate last year was $15 an hour, minimum 3 hours. The rate is now about $17/18ph. Sometime if there were more than 3 kids, i.e. multiple parents putting their kids together for the evening the rate may be doubled or more.
No petrol money was charged.
She doesn't do it anymore as we have our own baby to sit with.
HTH.

blackcountrygirl

I reckon a good baby sitter is worth his or her weight in gold, so pay them a fair wage , which you would expect for yourself, I think at least $15 per hour and have some goodies in the fridge for them, and if they stay over night I reckon give them a REAL good bonus

Sheila

thebears

We specially buy treats for them to make them feel welcome

But we have heard others don't even allow them to make cups of tea or coffee - how horrid some people can be

We just offered to make it "more her worthwhile".

geordie mandy

I used to baby sit as a mature teenager (14-18) and i got paid £5 for an evening and £10 if i stayed the night,( as i got older). i used to do the dishes (not asked) sort out the kids clothes for the next day. One of my charges was a baby under 6months. i used to make tea/coffee but never had anything to eat. i was made to feel old when i passed that baby recently with his girl friend

On the rare occasion i have had a babysitter for my 3 monsters i paid £30-£40 for the evening and made sure there was enough food in should they want anything to eat.

For what it's worth, no matter how committed to our children we are having a night out with your loved one, is something i think is vital in keeping a marriage ticking over. We all need adult time even if it is only for birthdays/anniversarys.
i try not to feel guilty having a nice time away from the kids, i would go even more insane than what i already am if i could not .
Mandy

webgum

Well said. I think its paramount to a healthy relationship. Afterall, one day, the kids will fly the coop.........and you wouldn't want to find yourself living with a stranger at that point.

My cousin here in Australia had some wise words when we arrived and didn't know a soul and she was offering to babysit. She said, go out on a regular basis - you may go out and not speak, go out and argue, go out and talk about the kids all night. None of this matters. Just spending time alone together away from home is what keeps your relationship alive, especially with all the added stress of moving to a new country.

The Corderys

Big question is where do you find the babysitter in the first place? Someone that you can trust, when you come over to a new country and know noone? We go out now when we have visitors over, it's one of our conditions of coming over But it sure would be nice to go out more often, and I find myself unable to ask someone who doesn't offer first.

webgum

Very true. Are your kids of school age? As I mentioned earlier in the thread, we have reciprocated with my son's friends parents. It is really really hard, and I felt unbelieveably lucky to have my cousin nearby. But, even she was a complete stranger at first, at I had only met her twice in my life!!

I probably found it harder when we moved to a new town in the UK, where we knew absolutely noone and family were a couple of hundred miles away (we might have well been Australia already for the amount of support they could offer.....)

NickyC

Both my kids were born here (though they're almost grown-up now) and we have no relatives within 20,000k.

We didn't go out THAT much but when we did either we mostly used friends in a similar situation (and reciprocated by babysitting their kids) or various pre-school teachers/helpers.

A really good source of trusty babysitters is usually your local pre-school/child-care centre/kindy. In our case the staff were all young, already known to the kids and were always on the lookout for some extra cash. Even if your kids don't go to child care, ask at your local centre if they can recommend someone. At least you know that the people they recommend actually like kids.

We had an early-childhood teacher's training college near us and I posted a ad on their notice-board for a student to help me with the boys once a week, during the week so I could just go and do the weekly shopping child-fee. We got an wonderful girl, worth her weight in gold and who, 18 years later, is still a good friend.

You could try asking at your local TAFE or Uni - or anywhere that trains child-care staff or teachers. I would much rather employ someone who had half a chance of coping in an emergency, rather than the average 15-year-old.

haggis supper

We pay our sitters about $10 per hour, depending on how long they sit and if we get back after midnight. If it's 3 hours we give them $25. If it's 4 hours we give $35. Anything more and we give $10 an hour. Plus Foxtel, food and drink !

The sitters are usually daughters of friends and are 16 years old. We gave one girls 50 bucks last week for sitting from 7.30pm to 12.15am. Her parents said we paid her too much.

The Crow

We have some similar friends - although the husband drinks when he's with OH. OH babysat for them and he had to repeat their prayers with them - I'd love to have seen him kneeling down saying 'I love Jesus'. Still they have been very kind.

The Corderys

We've managed to go out without our little man(3 years old)4 times in the last nearly two years but it'd be nice to be able to think about going to see the movie you want to see at the cinema, I think pirates of the caribean may be my inspiration to find someone.
Thanks for all the tips, I might see about checking at our local childcare or college then. I live quite a way from where my son goes to childcare(it's between home and work) so thought maybe the girls from there would find it a bit far to come out to where i live, but a notice on the local college/uni board would be a little closer or checking the local childcare centre.