Nannies are not independent contractors. They are employees of the family for whom they work. For this reason, parents who employ a nanny must take the steps necessary to establish themselves as legitimate employers!
When you want the nanny to reserve certain days and hours exclusively for your family, and if you want to set the conditions (working days & hours, holidays etc.) with your contract, you cannot expect the nanny to be self-employed.
It is not okay to ask a nanny (whether full-time or part-time) to work as a self-employed person to avoid paying them certain benefits and to try to pay less tax.
It is only in a few cases possible for the nanny to be self-employed. These are usually temporary contracts (e.g. Baby Nurse or Newborn Care Specialist contracts, Travel Nanny or Holiday Nanny positions).
In these cases, nannies usually offer their services to families as a business, and it’s okay to expect them to handle their own taxes and legal obligations. However, in these cases, you will not be their employer, but their client, and you will have to accept and respect their terms and conditions!
In the case of a temporary contract abroad (for example, you live in New York, you go on vacation to Italy, and you want to work with a nanny already there) being self-employed is in fact the only possibility for the nanny to work legally with the family!
However, a temporary contract does not always mean that the nanny must be self-employed… for some temporary contracts, nannies do not have to be self-employed!
It may often seem more convenient to ask the nanny to be self-employed, but this is often completely illegal!
