sitters.co.uk

As many of you already know, Hawkimus and I have a 2 year old little monster (meant in the nicest possible way!), our son, Jake. Since the day he was born, he has been the apple of my eye; able to make my emotions more unpredictable than the weather. So when it comes to childcare for my little pride and joy, I would not take the risk of leaving him with someone unable to deal with any arising situation (as is, I am sure, the case with every loving ...
...I see as less capable than Supernanny has had some setbacks! Such as being twenty six years old and not having had a night out for over a year! After a chat with Hawkimus, we decided enough was enough. We needed out!! Having moved area last year (and never going out to meet anyone!), we didn't have anyone to call on for babysitting duty. The only thing I knew was that whoever we asked would need to have enough knowledge of childcare to enable us ... more

As many of you already know, Hawkimus and I have a 2 year old little monster (meant in the nicest possible way!), our son, Jake. Since the day he was born, he has been the apple of my eye; able to make my emotions more unpredictable than the weather. So when it comes to childcare for my little pride and joy, I would not take the risk of leaving him with someone unable to deal with any arising situation (as is, I am sure, the case with every loving parent). However, my refusal to leave Jake with anyone I see as less capable than Supernanny has had some setbacks! Such as being twenty six years old and not having had a night out for over a year! After a chat with Hawkimus, we decided enough was enough. We needed out!! Having moved area last year (and never going out to meet anyone!), we didn't have anyone to call on for babysitting duty. The only thing I knew was that whoever we asked would need to have enough knowledge of childcare to enable us to have an enjoyable night that was worryfree. That was where Sitters came in.

WHO ARE THEY?

Sitters are the UK's leading evening babysitting service. All their childminders have experience of working in professional childcare and many are qualified nannies or nursery nurses. All sitters are fully reference checked and most have undergone a CRB check (bear in mind though that Nannies working for families are not currently required to have CRB checks). The service is available UK wide and there is a search engine on the website to check whether you live in an area that is covered.

THE WEBSITE

Currently their website is not working to it's full capacity although it is very simple to navigate and speed of connection to the various pages is quite fast. In the future, I believe that parents will be able to complete bookings on line (although this currently has to be done over the phone). As yet, I have not found any dead links on the site and it's overall design is very pleasing on the eye. Like I said though, it is a work in progress and although you have to complete the initial registration form on the internet, the company is not yet run as a completely internet-reliant service.

BOOKING INFORMATION

As per the previous section, registration is incredibly easy. You log onto the website - www.sitters.co.uk, fill out their online registration form and a representative from the agency calls you back to confirm your details and take your booking. Some things it is worth bearing in mind though are that all bookings must be for a minimum of four hours and generally childcare can be provided from 6pm onwards. You give a guide time as to how long you want the booking to last (we said midnight and arrived home at 11.30pm), so if you find you feel like an extra hour out, your sitter will anticipate this. A feature that I particularly like is that you can request to have the same sitter each time you book, that way they get to know your child and you get to know them. There is an upper limit to how many children the sitter is able to care for at any one time, either a maximum of five children or two if they are both under the age of three. Another thing is that Sitters cannot cater for children with special needs, the reason being that they can't guarantee to have sufficient carers in the area with the right expertise. Although Sitters do ask that you give them as much notice as possible for a booking, they are capable of filling booking with as little as four hours notice.

HOW MUCH DOES IT COST?

This is the only real issue I could find with Sitters, they are very expensive so I would only really use them on a special occasion. It would not suit my budget as a student to be paying out this kind of money every week!! The fees are as follows:

Membership (paid every three months) £12.75
Booking Fee (chargeable per booking) £4.00
Hourly rate for your sitter (paid at the end of your evening) £5.35

For your membership fee you can use the service as often or as little as you like within the three months, after the expiration of the three months, you can decide whether or not to renew. There are some exceptions and times when the hourly rate for your sitter increases. There are as follows:

Saturday bookings
Central London £6.50 per hour
South East England £5.85 per hour
All other areas of UK £5.50 per hour

There are also some dates such as New Years Eve and Valentines Day that incur extra charges, however you will always be informed of the rates charged prior to your booking being completed.

MY OVERALL IMPRESSION

The cost is the major factor with me. Our sitter, Ruth was lovely and completely put me at ease about leaving Jake in her care as she had over 18 years childcare experience. I will use their service again and would recommend it to anyone who has problems finding childcare however on my current budget, I would find it hard to use the service regularly as they are so expensive. It was worth paying for the peace of mind and the staff at Sitters were incredibly helpful throughout the booking process. Apart from the cost, I have nothing bad to say about them.

CONTACT DETAILS

The website is your first point of call at www.sitters.co.uk, the telephone number for bookings is a freephone number 0800 38 900 38 and this is open Mon - Fri 8am -7pm and on Sat 9am - 1pm. Sitters can also be emailed at enquiries@sitters.co.uk

Thanks for reading, Sarah xx 

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