I have a babysitter that I pay hourly to watch my child during the year. Having an hourly rate is benficial to us because sometime we need her more hours per week and sometimes less but we usually need her around the same amount of hours, around 35 hours a week. This flexibility also allows her to sometimes cancel in advance, and in those cases we have to find someone else to babysit, so agreeing to an hourly rate allows more flexibility then a weekly or monthly rate. My question is as follows, my mother is coming to town for the week and wants to watch her grandchild, Am I not obligated to pay the babysitter in this situation because we pay her hourly or should I just pay her anyway when my mother comes to town?
Answer:
An agreement with a babysitter is not generally something for which one pays a fixed monthly ‘salary’, and the agreement is such that one of the other sides can cancel, for instance if the child is unwell, and so on. As the question itself mentions, the arrangement is designed to be flexible. A grandmother coming to town is no different, and there is no need to pay the babysitter for the time that she is not required.
