Our current au pair, “E”, is leaving us at Christmas and it will as usual be a sad moment when we have to say goodbye. It is particularly tricky for the children of course who often become very attached to their care-givers. We have also become fond of E though of course, as with your own children, at some point you have to learn to let go and accept that they have been a part of your household but now the best thing for them is to make their own way…
This means we are now recruiting our fourth au pair and I thought it would be fun to create a blog post detailing the search as it goes on to give a sense of what actually happens when a host family decides to recruit an au pair to help out.
28th November, 2016
E has confirmed she will leave at Christmas and after initially thinking we would do without an au pair for now, given a recent change in circumstances, we’ve actually come to thwe opposite conclusion. Adding up the amount we’d play a cleaner (estimated: DKK1600/month) and for extra child care a few afternoons a week (estimate: 2400/month) plus the occasional night-time babysitting (estimated DKK500-1000/month), it is clear that an au pair is a similar cost financially but with much more flexibility. We have actually enjoyed the company of our au pairs too. They have really contributed different experiences and perspectives to our family in a way that a babysitter or cleaner doesn’t really. More importantly for us, we are a 3 language household and are seeking an au pair who speaks the minority language to help the children learn it. This also unfortunately narrows the pool of candidates considerably so I am prepared for a good few weeks/months of searching.
As a first step, I have reactivated our family profile on the usual website, Greataupair.com. This is very straightforward as even when not a paying member looking for an au pair, all the data is there. It’s simply then a matter of paying the fee, updating the dates and any relevant information and adding some new photos. I used the “FastMatch” funtion and spotted one or two possibilities straight away. This stage is a little like internet dating (I imagine!), and I contacted two strong possibilities and noted a few others (stored as favourites – the candidates can also see that they have been favourited and may opt to contact us – but this is only possible if they have paid also).
5th December 2016
It has proved to be trickier than usual to find good candidates. This may be because we usually recruit in early summer when school and university is over, whereas at Christmas there are fewer people wondering about living abroad. It has to be said, arriving in Copenhagen in January is probably not exactly the best time either – winter can be grey and miserable, not to mention long so we have to see if any of the contacts I have made will bite. I have been contacted by two other candidates but none of them are EU citizens (substantially complicating the paperwork) and more importantly neither is a native speaker of the language we are looking for. I have a policy of replying politely to all who get in touch but only considering candidates who fit our profile.
12th December 2016
A strong potential candidate, “E”, has emailed back saying she is interested. I have replied to see if she would like to arrange a skype meeting. I have also activated our account on the other website we regularly use aupairworld.com since our previous au pair M had used that much more and said she found it a better interface from the au pair point of view. I used the “easyfind” feature on this site and straight away came up with 3 matches who look very very promising. I have contacted all three. We’ll see who gets back to me – but right now it’s kind of exciting wondering who is on the other end of the computer and if we’ll be able to find the right kind of au pair who is a good fit with our family.
14th December
We have not yet heard anything from candidate “E” but one of the strongest and most impressive (on paper) candidates from au pair world has come back to me sounding very keen. On re-reading her profile she indeed looks a strong candidate and most importantly had specifically requested a big city in Denmark as a potential location. We have arranged to skype at the weekend. She has just graduated from university and is on a gap year travelling around the world. She is only looking for a 6 month position, when I would prefer a year, but if she is indeed the right candidate she could start in January and that is what we are aiming for right now. The next step is a chat and perhaps a separate formal interview. I normally like to have a couple of candidate lined up at this stage so it is a choice, but that may not be possible this time round. In any case, coming to Copenhagen in January is likely to provide enough challenges.
Updates after the first chat coming soon…
The Au Pair's Survival Guide 