תמונה הרב דוד אוחיון (2)
Country: ישראל

Question

If an employee was hired to babysit a child, and while she did do some work, she made a few huge mistakes. Two of the mistakes caused the children’s lives to be in danger and one mistake caused the child to go to the hospital. I’m not referring to lack of babysitting during a few moments; I’m referring to foolishness and doing things that are negligent.

Does the employer owe the babysitter money for the time that she worked? We hired her for 6 months with a salary, and we fired her after 4.5 days. Not to mention, we also paid for her to fly to America for vacation before she even started working with us.

Answer

Hello & Greetings

According to Jewish law, a person hired a babysitter and she committed a crime in keeping and did not keep it as it should clearly. In that case where it is clear that if the parents knew that this was her level of protection they would not take her as a babysitter for their children, there is no obligation to pay her at all, not even for the first days when no harm happened to the children.

However, a babysitter who kept in a reasonable and acceptable manner at first, and only on one day did not keep as she should, because she was busy with a phone call or was tired and fell asleep, etc., the halach law is divided as follows:

If the payment for is by hours or by days, it is necessary to pay her for the days and hours she kept fairly, and only for the time she did not keep properly there is no need to pay her.

However, if the payment is determined globally by month or  per a week, if she did not kept the children properly even on even one day out of the month or week, there is no need to pay it at all for the entire month or week.

It is important for me to note that it is not possible to rule on monetary law without hearing both sides, so my answer is only an instruction on what you must do if she does not sue you for a rabbi or a court of law, but if she sues you you will have to go and discuss with her.

Best wishes for health and comfort from the children

Rabbi David Ohayon

Sources and reasoning:

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