How to Use CareFinder

Welcome to the CareFinder community! We’re so glad to have you. Our team puts a lot of work into making CareFinder a simple, easy-to-use platform, but we know some of our new members may need a little help at first understanding how it works.

So, we’ve outlined the process for posting jobs, scheduling interviews and trial sittings, and finding your perfect sitter below!

1. Posting Your First Job

The best way to discover all of the wonderful babysitters in the CareFinder community -- and finding the perfect fit for your family! -- is to make your first job post available to “All Sitters.” This setting enables every sitter in the community (and remember, only sitters that have been thoroughly vetted and approved by the CareFinder Team are allowed on the platform) to see and apply to the job.

Note: There are also “Invite Only” and, eventually, “Individual” job postings, as well. “Invite Only” jobs are visible only to those babysitters you specifically request to apply. “Individual” jobs are best when you’ve worked with a specific sitter in the past and want to continue to do so moving forward; you can only invite sitters you've previously messaged or worked with. We recommend “All Sitters” for your first post since you have not yet interacted or worked with any of our sitters.

2. Job Details

Aside from the basics of your job -- the age/s of your child/ren, your location, the day, time and whether this job is a one-time or recurring need -- you’ll also need to give some thought to what you’d like to pay, if language is important and if you’ll need any additional services, like light housework or meal preparation. 

While your family’s needs will be specific to you and may change from job to job, we do have some helpful tips for deciding how much you’d like to pay. Additionally, unless you are specifically seeking out a language tutor, we recommend not being too much of a stickler for native speakers!

3. Application Review

Once you’ve posted your first job, sit back and wait for the applications to come in! Sitters who are interested will send you applications through CareFinder introducing themselves and outlining their backgrounds and expertise. You may receive more applications than you have time to review; don’t worry about getting through every one. Our sitters are used to sometimes not receiving a response to their applications. You only need to reach out to those sitters you are interested in working with.

Additionally, if you'd like to send invitations to specific sitters who have not yet applied, you can do that easily via the "Invite Sitters" button on your job.

4. Interviews and Trial Sittings

Now that you’ve picked out a few sitters you may like to work with, you can choose to set up an interview and/or a trial sitting. 

Interviews: You can conduct these in whichever way works best for you -- in-person, over the phone or virtually (ie. Skype or Zoom). Interviews are important to get to know each potential sitter a bit better, beyond what’s stated in their application or profile and to get a better feel for how they’ll work with your family. You can check out our interview tips for some insight into the questions you should ask. Compensating for interviews isn’t necessary, but we usually recommend paying for transit if you prefer to hold them in person.

Trial Sittings: These are exactly what they sound like: trial runs at actual babysitting! You can schedule an hour or so when you’ll be home to have the sitter come by to meet your children. This is a great, low-stakes setting to get an understanding of how the sitter will work with your family and also acclimate them to your children and your household ahead of an official job. Trial Sittings do require a separate job post and agreement on CareFinder, as sitters should be compensated for this time. The job posts should be "Individual" jobs so you can directly invite the sitter you are considering. See the next step for more details on job offers.

Note: CareFinder usually does not allow sharing personal contact information ahead or outside of an officially scheduled job for safety reasons. Because both interviews and trial sittings require coordination to communicate and/or meet, these are exceptions during which you can exchange that information and communicate outside of the CareFinder messaging system.

5. Job Offer and Acceptance

After interviewing and/or holding trial sittings with your candidates, you’re now ready to choose the sitter that will be best for your family! Once you send an offer for the original job post, the sitter can then agree to the rate and terms, or negotiate. As a note, rates and terms should be topics covered during the interview process, so there shouldn’t be too much back-and-forth once an offer has been extended.

Note: Once the offer is accepted by the sitter, if you haven’t already during the interview/trial sitting phase, please ensure you’ve given them the address of the job as well as a contact phone number.

6. Before, During and After the First Job

Ahead of your first babysitter experience, you may be a bit nervous. That’s normal! We have some helpful tips on preparing yourself, your kids and your home for a babysitter that you should check out. Most importantly, be sure to be extra clear about any household rules or other expectations you might have missed during the interview process.

During the sitting, you can request that the sitter send you updates on how things are going (this is fine to do outside of the CareFinder platform if you want photos).

After the sitting, the sitter will send you a digital payment request, which outlines the total breakdown of fees, including any applicable transit fees. You can choose to accept, dispute or add more money as needed. If the request goes unanswered within 24 hours, the credit card you have on file with CareFinder will be automatically charged.

7. Leave a Review!

How was your experience with your babysitter? Be sure to leave a review! You can do this directly on CareFinder by clicking on the sitter’s profile and scrolling to the “Write a Review” button. Sitter reviews on the CareFinder site help other families find great sitters, and they help the CareFinder team keep tabs on how our babysitters are doing.

Additionally, if you’d like to tell more people about your experience with CareFinder, it’s always appreciated! You can do that via Google’s review system. Simply search “CareFinder Japan” and our Google result, with the option to rate and review us, will pop up.

8. Future Jobs

Now that you’ve had a successful first experience with CareFinder, you’re all set to schedule additional jobs as needed! Moving forward, you can choose to continue to post “All Sitter” jobs (new babysitters join CareFinder every day, so there are always opportunities to meet someone who will be a great fit for your family!).

You can also choose to post “Invite Only” jobs and invite sitters who you interviewed or messaged previously, but perhaps weren’t a fit for that specific job. This is an opportunity to reach out to new sitters who have joined CareFinder since your last job and seem like they may be a fit!

You may want to create an “Individual” job instead and invite the babysitter you worked with previously. Many families in the CareFinder community will work with the same sitter for all of their babysitting needs. We love to see relationships between the families and babysitters in our community develop and if you find someone who fits well with your family and your needs, we definitely recommend working with them whenever you can! It is helpful, however, to have a backup or two in case your preferred sitter is unavailable or otherwise unable to help on any given day.

These instructions should be all you need to get started. If you do find yourself hitting stumbling blocks, though, you can always contact the CareFinder Team at info@carefinder.jp anytime or give us a call at 03-6825-0488 during business hours.