As COVID continues to circulate, one of the most common questions we hear is what to do when you, your family, or your nanny may have been exposed. It can be hard to know how to handle canceling care, paying your nanny, and deciding when it’s safe to resume child care.
Below, we walk through four different scenarios and explain how to handle each one, including payroll and when care can safely resume. We hope you find it helpful.
To view the COVID-19 Return to Work/School Flow Chart referenced in these scenarios, please click here.
If you aren’t currently a member of our community, we’d love to have you join. Nannies can join our community totally FREE and our Family/Parent memberships start at only $8.99/month!
Here is what you should do if either you or your nanny gets COVID. By “you,” we mean your family, which could be any member of your household.
Below are four different scenarios covering what happens with payroll, who should do what, and how to handle each situation.
Scenario #1:
The family has to call out for the day because the nanny child or someone in the household has COVID symptoms, suspects they may have COVID, or has been in close contact with somebody who has COVID.
You should cancel for the day and not take any chances. Everybody should quarantine after they’re able to get a test. Sometimes it can take several days to get a test result, and right now things are getting busy in many areas. So when you get your negative test result and it’s been 24 hours since your fever has passed and your symptoms have improved, it’s OK to call things back on and go back to work or to have your nanny come back into your home.
But what happens with payroll in that scenario? Absolutely, the nanny should still get paid under guaranteed hours if the family is the one who calls out.
Scenario #2:
Your nanny calls out because they have suspected COVID, they’ve been in close contact with someone who has COVID, or they’re experiencing COVID symptoms.
Of course, everybody should have good communication and everybody should cancel for the day. The nanny should not go to work that day. They should get a test, so should the family members, and then everyone should quarantine while awaiting the result. Much like in Scenario #1, it’s OK to go back to work once you have received that negative test result, once any fever has passed, and once your symptoms have improved.
What happens in that scenario? How is payroll handled? Since the nanny is the one who called out, that means it should fall under their sick time.
Scenario #3:
If you have known contact with someone who had COVID-19, stay home in quarantine. You should get a COVID test three to five days after your known exposure. Then you should quarantine until your results come back. Assuming your results come back negative, you can then safely go back to work.
In this scenario, if the nanny calls out, that would fall under sick time. If the family is the one who has to cancel on the nanny, then just as in the other two scenarios, that should fall under guaranteed hours.
Scenario #4:
What happens if the family or nanny gets COVID-19?
You should isolate and cancel for the day. Per CDC guidelines, you can return to work 10 days after symptoms started, assuming any fever you had has passed and any symptoms have improved. You should confirm things are all good to go with a COVID test that comes back with a negative result. By this time, you’re probably starting to see a pattern develop.
If it’s the nanny who calls out, that falls under the nanny’s sick time. Payroll-wise, they should be able to utilize their sick time for that.
And if it’s the family who calls out as a result of COVID, then they should be paid under guaranteed hours, so the nanny shouldn’t be out any income because they were available and ready to work.
We’ve received a lot of questions about this from both parents and nannies about how to handle these situations, so we hope this information is helpful.
Just to review, symptoms of COVID include a fever of 100.4 or higher, sore muscles, fatigue, body aches, congestion, diarrhea, nausea, vomiting, loss of taste or sense of smell, shortness of breath or difficulty breathing, and can also include a runny nose or a headache.
Your local Department of Public Health has a fantastic flowchart that helps walk through all of these scenarios, so please check out the link below. If you would like to print it out and keep it handy in case one of these scenarios does pop up, you can have it ready to go as a quick reference.
Click here to view the flowchart