London worker logs 70-hour weeks babysitting after full-time job to cover bills
A 25-year-old said babysitting shifts after her 9-to-5 ‘only just about’ cover living costs in the British capital
Danni Cleary, 25, said she routinely works as many as 70 hours a week by combining a full-time office role with evening and weekend babysitting to meet the cost of living in London.
Cleary, originally from Devon, said she works Monday through Friday from 9 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. in a full-time role and then takes paid babysitting shifts. On social media she posted a month-by-month breakdown of earnings and deductions, saying the extra work “only just about covers my bills, as well as my full time job.”
In June, Cleary reported gross babysitting income of £1,761.49 from caring for 25 families. After tax, transport costs and platform fees she said the month’s take-home pay was £1,252.04. She said she worked what she described as “stupid hours,” with only five days in the month without babysitting and multiple shifts on many other days.
In July her reported gross income from babysitting was £1,003.33, but she did not work on 17 days in that month — 10 of them taken as holiday — leaving a net of £751.41 after deductions. Cleary charges £15 an hour for babysitting, according to her posts.
Cleary said she previously worked in business operations and is now self-employed for her childcare shifts. She shared the breakdown and commentary on the TikTok platform, where she described both gratitude for higher-earning months and the toll of long combined workweeks.
Her posts lay out the arithmetic of combining a salaried daytime role with gig work and provide an account of the time and costs associated with supplementing a primary salary in London. Cleary highlighted that transport and app fees reduce the amount that reaches her bank account, and she cautioned that months with fewer shifts or paid time off produce much lower net income.
Cleary’s account adds to anecdotal reporting about workers taking secondary jobs to meet household expenses in high-cost cities, but she did not provide broader data on prevalence. She framed her own approach as necessary to cover bills rather than as a long-term preferred arrangement.
In her videos, Cleary invited viewers to examine the numbers she posted and to consider the trade-offs between extra income and hours worked, while noting that not every month yields the same level of additional earnings.