Newborn day care

[paulucj]

Hi - I have read a posting regarding nurseries for infants in Geobabies and to my understanding there are none in HKG. I have search the internet and only found nurseries that takes above 2 years old.

My wife and I will be expecting our child in August and we are looking for daycare/nursery in HK where the baby can be looked after with care and attention during working hours. We would not mind a day-time helper who can come to our house between 8am to 6pm.

Your advice and suggestions will be helpful.

Paul

[lemonade]

As far as I am aware, there is no such thing as a daycare for infants similar to what you would find in North America, for example. My understanding, based on what I have experienced, is that infants are looked after either by extended family or full-time, live-in domestic helpers.

As for your question re: having a domestic work during the day. Part-time, live-out help (and I am talking here about domestic helpers that largely come from the Philippines, Indonesia etc. and would be in Hong Kong on a Foreign Domestic Helper visa) domestic help is officially against the law in Hong Kong. However, you can hire local domestic workers, i.e., local Hong Kong Chinese.to work part-time and know of at least one person that does this. I looked at this very briefly when we were looking for domestic help as I was contemplating having a helper that could speak to my daughter in Chinese but we ended up not doing it in the end.

I believe that I have seen discussions on this website about locating local part-time help so I would do a search on this site to seek out further information if this is the route you want to go. I seem to recall when I was looking that there was a scheme run by the government as well as charitable/religious institutions like Caritas that you could contact for further information.

[lemonade]

This might help with locating local domestic help:

Local Domestic Helpers > Employer Zone

[lucy0]

My friend sent me this, I have not read it yet, hope it can help.
Social Welfare Department

Cheers,
Lucy

[LeahH]

You shouldn't have too much trouble finding a live out helper, trained nanny or local domestic worker. It may just be more costly than a live in foreign domestic helper - the norm in HK.

1 on 1 care, in your own home, from the same person consistently, would be preferable to any type of daycare or nursery for young children, in particular for newborns.

[Minka]

I am looking for a part time helper too (legal ones). It is easier to find daytime local helper for $50 per hour. But I have trouble finding evening babysitter when we have to go out. Does anyone have suggestions for a babysitter for a 6.5 month old baby? Thanks!

[AussieMum]

Minka, we used Rent-a- mum when we didn't have a helper. I actually used a lady by the name of Nicole (an Australian lady) and she was really good, well experienced and seemed very kind natured. I would use her again. Know many others that use this service and have also been happy with them. Shirley the owner is very nice and informative, I chatted with her for probably 20 minutes before deciding to go ahead. Only negative with rent-a-mum is they are quite pricey (around $180 per hour from memory, min of 4 hours), but I felt comfortable paying this for the level of service I got, and piece of mind that I had left someone whom I felt comfortable with. Rent-A-Mum ? Family Care

Rent-A-Mum ? Family Care

[Minka]

Thank you for the suggestion. I just emailed Rent-A-Mom and wait for her reply. Other than Rent-A-Mom, are there any other recommendations? I already posted an ad by the Labor Department. I request them to post both in English and Chinese but no reply yet.