How Much Should I Charge?

[cherryhill]

I have been watching a little boy since the first week of September. He is non related but my brothers live-in girlfriends son. I already give them a discount for daycare, not sure why but I do. My full time rate is 225.00 a week, she pays 180.00 a week.

She asked me today if I can watch him Sunday night from 7pm to Tuesday night 7pm. (yeah I know) She is going to Las Vegas for work. My brother can not watch him because she is out of State for training. He is in the Marines. Her family lives about 8 hours away. So she has no friends or family in the area.



Thanks

[Christian Mother]

I would say double your rate. It is what I do for over nights. I charge $25 a day (10 hrs) and for over nights an additional $25. That wld be $50 per day. For you since you charge $180 a wk that breaks down to $36 a day so double that and it would be $72. Then you have the one day til 6pm. So it would be 2 1/2 days at $180. I added 72+72+36= 180.

[Blackcat31]

Personally, I would charge her your normal daycare rate during the hours he is in daycare, however.......if he will someday be family by marriage, I would honestly consider doing it as a favor for free (ya, I know...) IF you and her have a good relationship, she will not simply expect the "free" care again and again and if he is generally a good kid and won't be too much trouble to watch.

I guess I can't really offer much more advice since I have no idea about the particulars of your relationship with her and/or your brother.

[SilverSabre25]

2 overnights, 2 full days, plus some more time... her daily rate is $36?

[math]=
For Monday and Tuesday regular hours, I would charge $36 each day obviously.

For the two overnights--if he is a good sleeper, probably $20/night, otherwise if you're going to have to get up with him a couple times, $30/night.

For the extra hours (wake-up to reg. drop off and reg pick-up to bedtime), maybe an extra $20 total, plus another $10 for extra food (dinner).

36+36+20+20+20+10= $142. You could drop it to $140 for a nice round number if you want. Expensive? Hell yeah! But, look at it this way--that's 48 hours of care, about the same amount in an average week (I'm guessing).

You could also do it by looking at how much her "per hour" works out to (weekly contracted hours divided by 180) and then multiply that by 48.

[daycare]

Just want to give you a heads up about doing this. I just went to a class last Wednesday about proper behavior by age.
Well some how the topic of ratio came up and it became A 35 min. conversation. The lady from state told us about a similar situation in CA where a DCF asks the provider to watch their child for a weekend so they could attend a family wedding. So the DCP watched said DCF child and off they went. Two weeks later, another family caught wind of the weekend get away and asked the provider to watch their child for an over night stay. The DCP declined and of course this family got mad and reported her. Licensing came out to inspect and in the end the provider was sited for sleeping while having a child in her care. In California you must be awake at all times when children are present. No matter what time of day or night it is.

I know it's your family, but I don't think that I would open that can of worms unless you have someone who can take shifts with you and can be within CA regulations.
Also be prepared to offer this to other families as well.

[cherryhill]

Personally, I would charge her your normal daycare rate during the hours he is in daycare, however.......if he will someday be family by marriage, I would honestly consider doing it as a favor for free (ya, I know...) IF you and her have a good relationship, she will not simply expect the "free" care again and again and if he is generally a good kid and won't be too much trouble to watch.

I guess I can't really offer much more advice since I have no idea about the particulars of your relationship with her and/or your brother.

I have not known her for long, just a few months. I do believe she will be my SIL soon. My brother and I are close. I would only do this for him. He will be away almost a year and he just left. I'm sure this will happen again. I am worried that if I do it for free she will expect it. I take her son with me a few hours some weekends to give her a break, plus my daughter is the same age. I do this on my terms though.

[Blackcat31]

I have not known her for long, just a few months. I do believe she will be my SIL soon. My brother and I are close. I would only do this for him. He will be away almost a year and he just left. I'm sure this will happen again. I am worried that if I do it for free she will expect it. I take her son with me a few hours some weekends to give her a break, plus my daughter is the same age. I do this on my terms though.

If she will expect it for free in the future I would definitely charge her then. But I would do it on a discounted level because she is/will be family. I would tell her thought that just because you were available to care for him this time, you cannot always be her weekend or night time provider. I would then try to hook her up with centers, providers or perhaps responsible babysitters who will be her go-to provider for this type of need. I would then watch him at your discretion as you said on the weekends and nights it does work for you.

This is similar to my relationship with my sister. She had her child in my childcare and she paid like everyone else. However she worked late hours sometimes and needed care for hours I wasn't normally open. I took my niece WHEN I chose too but NOT usually when she asked me...kwim? I don't know why there is a difference between doing it when I wanted vs when she wanted but there was.

I think in your situation you need to have some good old open and honest communication with her in advance so she knows you will help her out this ONE time for a fee and that in the future you will not always be available so she will need to have alternate care arrangements. Also add that when you do want to take him with your dd, you will do so when you initiate it.

[cheerfuldom]

Take her daily rate and double it per day/night you are watching him. Thats what I do. Be careful about this discount though....if they get married, you are going to be expected to offer all of this care long term!

[Meyou]

I used to tell my SIL that I was the daycare lady from M-F 730 to 530 but that I was Auntie the rest of the time. If they needed me to watch her late they could ask and if I wasn't busy then I would but that daycare hours ended when daycare hours ended. It worked out well for us. They always pd me no questions asked during dc hours but anythign extra was seperate and needed to treated as such. It worked out well for us. My neice had lots of sleepovers during the week because of work things her parents had on but we never had a conflict between DC and auntie.

Sooo...if this was me I would watch him in the evenins for free but I would be sure to tell her that DAY is DC and evening is a favor because my brother loves you.