Hi All - I am the mommy of a wonderful almost-4 year old boy, but probably a little too paranoid for my own good when it comes to looking for a babysitter. We've been fortunate so far in that we've been able to work out childcare arrangements that allowed either my husband or a close family friend to be home with our son. After almost-4 years, though, Mom and Dad would like to start getting out on their own a little more! I noticed the advertisement for Sittercity.com in the Mamasource Member Perks area, but before paying the money to sign-up for it, wanted to find out if anyone here had used it, and what your experience was? Thanks!!
Wow! So many quick responses! A friend recommended Mamasource, and now I'm glad she did!!
As expected, people have had good and bad experiences with the same thing. What struck me about the Sittercity.com website is that to find a sitter, you have to 'join' and pay (what I thought) was kind of a steep monthly fee, but to register as a sitter to look for a job, there didn't seem to be any charge. I think we're going to do some more local and 'word-of-mouth' checking, first...
Thanks to all for your responses!
Someone I worked with did use this and was robbed by the sitter the first time they sat. That's all I have heard about the site.
Hi R.,
We moved away to Chicago 2 years ago where we didn't know a soul....no friends or family. Someone suggested www.sittercity.com to me because they had success with it, so I tried it. Loved it! I posted a 'job' on there for an occasional sitter and within 24 hours, we had like 23 people respond. I picked 3 who I thought would be our best match, and my husband and I inerviewed them. We picked a 20-year-old girl who we absolutely loved.....and our son did too! When we moved back to Columbus, we wished we could have brought her with us. The thing with sittercity is that the sitters on there charge a lot....at least in my opinion. A lot compared to your typical teenage babysitter or sitters on www.craigslist. We paid our sitter there $10.00/hr so we really couldn't afford to go out very often, but when we did we knew our son was in good hands....and you can't put a price on that! Good luck!!
Be careful...they do not do backgound checks on their sitters and have never met them face to face. Using a nanny placement agency that also has on-call babysitters is a safer route.
You could call your local town hall and see if they have a referal group or anything. You might be able to look into the area home child care providers if they don't do after hours care they might be able to refere someone to you.
