You are professional – be treated professionally
With the Nanny pilot scheme on the horizon and nannies receiving new attention we thought it is a good time to bring back to mind a fundamental truth in the in-home childcare sector. You are a professional, be treated as one. This means you should be legally employed.
Unfortunately this is not always the case. Even though we have seen a great shift towards professionalism during the last 25 years the Nanny sector is still perceived as one prone to cash-in-hand employment with websites and online platforms making it easy for families to find and contact nannies directly.
While it is great to have easy access to great jobs it is also important to ensure that the ‘great job’ is really great. And a great job for a Nanny is not only to work for a lovely family that respects and values the work s/he does. A great job also gives the securities that come with legal employment.
Legal employed means that the family as your employer or you when being a contractor pay your tax, superannuation, work cover and entitlements. You also get an overview of the tax the family paid for you at the end of the financial year which you can use in order to do your tax return. If you never filled in a Tax File Number declaration, never received a PAYG Summary, never saw any information about superannuation being paid for you it is very likely that you are not legally employed.
The following dangers occur when lacking legal employment:
- You might get paid way below minimum wage for not being employed under an award such as the Children Services Award 2010.
- You don’t accumulate Superannuation Payments hence you don’t contribute to the money you will receive after retirement.
- You don’t pay tax and the tax office might charge you and the family.
- Questions about insurance and liability will occur in case anything happens to the children, to the family’s home or to you.
- Without a job contract there is no document stating responsibilities for you and the family.
- You miss out on your entitlements such as paid sick and annual leave (depending on the kind of employment).
One possibility to guarantee legal employment is to go through an agency such as Placement Solutions. Being employed professionally gives you the security of a payroll system, legal employment including superannuation, tax and work cover as well as support and help in all situations.
If you want to talk to us further about possibilities of legal employment give us a call on 1300 854 624.
Let us know what you think. Do you think cash in hand should be a legal option to professional employment? What are your concerns about working cash in hand? Or have you had any bad experiences?
Sonja Winkelmann (Recruiter)