Babysitter PRSI Ireland: an employer guide

You have found a sitter you trust and they will be in your home most weeks. Then someone mentions PRSI and you wonder if you have missed a form.

babysitter PRSI Ireland is the Pay Related Social Insurance contribution paid on a worker’s earnings. It becomes your job in one situation only: when the sitter is your employee. For a casual sitter, it usually isn’t. This guide shows how to tell the difference, how employer PRSI works, and who pays when the sitter is self-employed.

Our babysitter tax guide explains who owes what on the tax side. Here we stay with PRSI. Hiring a sitter for the first time? Browse babysitters in Ireland before you work out the PRSI side.

Key Takeaways
– Babysitter PRSI Ireland is the parent’s job only if the sitter is an employee.
– An occasional sitter may be self-employed and handle their own tax and PRSI.
– Revenue’s rule: register as an employer at €40 or more paid in a week.
– From 1 October 2026, employer PRSI on weekly pay of €38 to €352 is 9.15%.

Babysitter PRSI Ireland applies only to an employee

Whether babysitter PRSI Ireland is yours to handle depends on how the sitter works for you. Citizens Information gives a simple test. If the homeowner deducts tax and pays PRSI on the worker’s behalf, the worker is employed as a domestic worker. It lists childminding among the duties such a worker may do.

It also says someone who only works occasionally in a home may not be a domestic worker. They may be self-employed, and then they pay their own taxes and their own babysitter PRSI Ireland. If you live in Dublin, you can browse babysitters in Dublin. Employer PRSI babysitter Ireland rules start at €38 a week of pay.

So ask how regular and ongoing the work is:

• A sitter who covers the odd Saturday night is likely to be casual.
• A sitter who minds your children three afternoons a week is likely to be an employee.
• If you can’t tell, Revenue sets out a five-step framework for deciding between employee and self-employed.

Employer babysitter PRSI Ireland: how it works

When your sitter is an employee, Citizens Information says you deduct PAYE, PRSI and USC from their wages, pay employer’s PRSI to the Social Insurance Fund and give them a payslip. From 1 October 2026, the Department of Social Protection sets employer PRSI at 9.15% on weekly pay of €38 to €352. Want to compare sitters? In Meath, try babysitters in Meath.

You are an employer even though the workplace is your kitchen. The Department publishes rates for the standard employee class, Class A, which covers reckonable pay of €38 or more a week. The Class A rates page lists each band from 1 October 2026:

Take a sitter paid €100 a week. The employer PRSI on that is €9.15, and the sitter pays none. That is arithmetic on the published rate.

Rates change: the page showed a different employer rate up to 30 September 2026. Check it before you set up pay. Babysitter PRSI Ireland questions start with one test: is your sitter an employee?

What a self-employed babysitter pays in PRSI

If your sitter is self-employed, you don’t deduct babysitter PRSI Ireland. They deal with it themselves.

Revenue’s two tests for the self-employed

Revenue sets two tests for the self-employed:

• a minimum annual income of €5,000
• age 16 or over, with an upper age limit

It adds that they usually pay at Class S.

The test uses the sitter’s own annual income, not what any one family pays them. Do I pay PRSI for babysitter Ireland? Only if the sitter is your employee.

We haven’t quoted the Class S rate, because Revenue’s page still shows older figures. A self-employed sitter should check the current rate with Revenue or the Department of Social Protection.

For someone who minds children as a business, our guide to self-employed childminder tax in Ireland covers the same ground.

Register as an employer before you pay employer PRSI

You can’t pay babysitter PRSI Ireland as an employer until Revenue knows you are an employer. Revenue’s page on registering childminders as employees says the general rule is simple. Generally, if you hire a childminder regularly in your home, you must register as an employer.

Two triggers apply. One is paying a sitter at home €40 or more in a week. The other is having a second employee at the same time.

Note the small gap in the numbers. The Class A table starts at €38, and Revenue’s registration trigger is €40. If your sitter’s pay falls close to those figures, ring the employer helpline on 01 738 3638, the number Citizens Information gives for employer questions.

Keep records of what you pay

Citizens Information says employers must keep certain records about their employees, to show they comply with employment legislation. The employer must keep these records for 3 years, and the duties include a record of the hours worked. Workplace Relations Commission inspectors will need access to the records during an inspection.

Even if you think your sitter is self-employed, write down dates, hours and what you paid. A simple log helps if anyone asks how you handled babysitter PRSI Ireland.

Find a babysitter

Once you know whether you are hiring an employee or a casual sitter, the next step is finding the right person. To start your search, see babysitters in Cork.

Frequently asked questions

Q: Do I pay PRSI on a babysitter in Ireland?

A: Only if the sitter is your employee. Citizens Information says an employer deducts PRSI from wages and pays employer PRSI too. A casual sitter who is self-employed handles their own PRSI.

Q: Does a babysitter pay PRSI if they are self-employed?

A: Revenue says they do if their annual income is at least €5,000 and they are 16 or over, with an upper age limit. babysitter PRSI Ireland for a self-employed sitter is their own responsibility.

Q: What is employer PRSI for a babysitter?

A: It is the contribution you pay on top of the employee’s wages. The Department of Social Protection sets it at 9.15% on weekly pay of €38 to €352 from 1 October 2026.

Q: Do I pay PRSI if I pay my sitter under €38 a week?

A: The Class A table starts at weekly pay of €38. Revenue’s registration trigger is €40 a week. For pay near or below those figures, ring the national employer helpline on 01 738 3638.