Pricing with no receipt

[CrazyEight]

Agree with the above posters. Even if you both refer to it as "babysitting" and she's only watching your children and hers, if it's on a regular basis and more than 10 hours per week, legally speaking, she is a home daycare provider. She's legally required to give you a receipt, whether she wants to or not, whether you want it or not - and why wouldn't you? You can claim everything you pay for childcare and get a large break on your income taxes for daycare for 3 kids.

By taking payment under the table and not declaring it to the CRA, she is actually committing fraud. Anything earned over $50 a week needs to be declared and have taxes paid on it. She can deduct expenses such as food costs, toys, part of her hydro costs, etc, on her taxes and she won't end up paying too much if she's only making income from you, but she still needs to declare it.

There are so many hard-working, legitimate, above-board providers around Ontario that are being hurt by the new legislation that has come in, and it's been pushed through partly because of people breaking the law. People warehousing kids, working under the table, and breaking the law has affected us all in a very negative way. You're not going to find many legit providers that are ok with hearing about a situation like this.

Plus, even though you trust her, and I don't doubt her motives or capabilities, but doing everything above-board protects you both. You should at the very least sit down and write out a basic contract to prevent a good friendship from going sour very quickly. What is she going to feed your kids? Are they going to be allowed to watch TV? How will she discipline them? What if you pick up late or start asking her for 5 days a week instead of 3 or 4? What if one of you wants to end the arrangement for whatever reason? Doing everything in a professional, legal, legitimate way will prevent a lot of potential headaches later.