Our 17 year old Nephew just graduated from high school and a 2 year automotive Vo-tech school, and he and my SIL both think he is going to come work for us...

Last summer he wanted some hands on experience, so we hired him part time. DH was really disappointed with both his skill level and his work ethic - or lack there of - I should say.

This year he worked for a big chain auto repair shop, and hated it. He claimed the management treated him badly, that there was "nothing to do" and he didn't get enough hours.

DH decided to try and give him another shot, hoping he would have gained more experience and learned a lot this year.

Today we basically paid him for 6 hours to do nothing but keep the forklift seat warm! DH told him to start dismantling 2 cars & a forklift that we are scraping - what teenage boy would not using power tools to destroy a car?!  Then, he actually had the nerve to complain to our other mechanic that "we give him all the crap work."

We have finally gotten our business established enough to the point where we are making a decent living from it and we just cannot afford to be a babysitting service too! Not only is he lazy, but I feel he could be a liability - he actually tried to mount tires on the wrong size rims - which if DS had not stopped him before he used the machine to pressurize them could have been a disastrous and dangerous mistake.

It is ironic, our 14 year old DS come to work with us on "take your child to work day"  - at 14, with  no training, he worked harder, learned more, and accomplished more in 1 day than our 17 year old nephew with 2 years of Vo-Tech training could manage in a whole week!

So, now DH is in the awkward position of having to explain to his sister and his nephew that we cannot hire him...

That is a really great suggestion. However, coming up with an actual rubric would be very difficult because everyday is so different at our shop. One day we could have 6 regular cars in for inspections, the next day a major rebuild on a piece of heavy equipment, and the day after, a vintage car in for restoration. The kind of work that we do requires a lot of skill, experience, and attention to detail - all of which Nephew just does not have...

I think letting him stay on any longer in able to do an assessment would just too much of a distraction for DH, and he is going to have to bite the bullet and tell them this weekend that it just is not going to work out...

hmm.... he probably thinks he doesn't have to work hard because he's the owner's nephew...so sad.
It is a hard situation, but, you are right, it needs to be dealt with now, before something bad happens!

Good luck!