Employing someone?

We do have a system of emergency care Aggie and I wonder if it works a bit like that? These things do seem to differ from Trust to Trust and LA to LA.

My mother has had this several times; once on leaving hospital and at other times in order to keep her out of hospital. It is for a maximum of six weeks and is free to anyone for whom the doctors request it, as the money comes from the NHS. The carers, however, still come from local care companies and are actually contracted to the local authority. The last time - at the beginning of December - although the doctors requested it after two falls in four days, we simply did not get this as there were not enough carers available because care companies in this area will not work for the amount set by the local authority. We covered the period (with difficulty) but it did lead to the local authority agreeing to permanent extra care which we now have and which is marvellous. And, although obviously short of money, the LA have been very helpful too.

You really couldn't make up a more complex system could you?

... maybe GracesGran you should get out more.

Just seen that aggie. Was it really necessary? We are all dealing with complex situations and I had not come across carers direct from the NHS. As the care system is run by the Local Authority it would be good to hear of schemes that tie the NHS and Care together.

The Carers have been coming for the last two years , maybe more , my memory ain't the best , he was mobile when they started but is now immobile . There are six girls on a Rota , some are better than others but all range from competent to excellent , they are employed by the local Hospital Trust not an agency . One agency girl told us the Agency charged the NHS £19 an hour and she got £7 ! So it is no wonder they try to get extra

No it wasn't neccessary , I apologise things are a bit awry here at the moment

That sounds an excellent arrangement.
Its obviously not rolled out countrywide. What a pity.

I have carers coming in to my H once a day at present, I could have more visits and started off with 2 but the evening call was too late and my H was ready for bed long before then.
We are on week 5 of 6 which are free and provided by SS
After this we will pay and SS will find me an agency or I can find my own.
I think It is approx £17:50 to £20 an hour.
I do not need an hour so will try to cope if I can,the minimum visit is an hour with the agency I prefer.

At the start I thought we had the carers too much but am glad I didn't say anything , we really need them now

As others have pointed out there are costs in employing people. All the ones as an employer, including criminal checks, plus training for staff plus providing staff to cover sickness of a staff member. Your mother cannot do that. These overheads and others are the cost that makes the difference between what your mother would pay them and what she actually pays the agency. You should stick with the agency.

My mum had the 6 weeks reablement, but the timings were ridiculous, and the women lacked empathy, really.
The agency women were much nicer (mostly) but didn't seem to have much idea what they were doing.

i forgot cover for annual leave.

I have an advert now, inviting me to 'open a care agency'!

They are here too aggie.

I haven't come across that sort of set-up but it bodes well for any attempt to join Care with the NHS, which seems so obvious to me but doesn't seem to have done so for successive governments. If there are some areas doing this then they will have something to look at if they do consider it.

We used agency staff for my FiL, but they never really developed a relationship with him and they never used common sense. They’d put washing in the machine, but forgot to tell next person. They could never get him to shower!
We then found a mother and daughter who lived locally and they were lovely with him, treated him like a daughter and grand daughter would. They were also flexible and we could contact them directly if there were any concerns. He was really comfortable and happy with them.

Keep with the agency and try and have a quiet word with carers about topics they discuss with your mum. Have the same problem with my daughter, I tell her something and then she checks it out with carers who have not idea of the topic or situation. I am just about to tell my daughter that I will no longer act as POA (she has limited capacity) if she carries on this way. Also if she employed her carers she would have all sorts of things to do, pension, holiday pay and cover, contract of employment just to name of few. Suggest to her that she could always tip the carers or give them a present of money at Christmas.

I have seen a good few adverts, on mainstream sites for a carer. Then when you look for details, its made clear that you would be claiming 'carers allowance' for the person.
Seems strange, but I suppose its quite a workable and legal solution.

This is when these threads become so useful. I hadn't heard that MissA. I am thinking how it would be done. The carer would have to be caring for 35 hours a week wouldn't they and I presume (?) would have to claim themselves. The person could then pay them up to £116 a week. They wouldn't get it if they were claiming the state pension but then I doubt they would be. You get an NI credit if you claim carers allowance too. I think the cared for person might loose some of their disability allowance though.

However, complicated though that sounds, if you needed to employ someone pretty much full time it is £62.70 a week that you would not have to find.

Iam a low paid carer, but this would not be acceptable to me. Iam insured with the company I work with, I have the back up of asking senior staff anything, medication etc. The laws are quite complicated around this sort of thing. Also poaching staff is illegal. My company asks that all gifts over the value of £5 are declared to keep staff from false accusations.

I'm afraid that I would report to the agency that their staff are complaining to your mother about aspects of their work contracts. Whether they are hinting that they change to a personal arrangements or not, it's unprofessional. They choose to work for the agency and, if they preferred to be self employed, they should have gone down that route in the first place and got their own clients!!

It's true that the person being cared for is likely to become close to regular carers and feel they ought to contribute in some way to help their situation. DH used to call in on Mum from time to time and warn me that she was 'Going into Lady Bountiful mode.'

I kept a close eye on things as her cleaner had also started to become a bit clingy so was quite relieved when Mum finally went into care because her dementia had increased.

I arrived at her care home one morning though to find her full of beans. The reason being, she told me, was that she'd won the lottery, bought the whole place and given all the girls a pay rise!

Coincidentally, someone has just phoned me to ask if I would be interested in becoming a carer, with the arrangement that I claim the allowance.

been there got the tshirt dad has a cleaner the sad hard luck stories make you cry omg very unperfessional to talk about pay . yes its wrong and agree a few jobs a few stories a few extras,older people do not see the problems ,just keep an eye out

My mum enjoyed chatting to her carers about everything under the sun.
Their lazy husbands (my mum found one of them a job in Argos!) and so on. She knew they were poorly paid, knew their childrens names, etc.

When my son got direct payments from the local Council, we asked an agency to find him a suitable Personal Assistant. They found him a very caring young man a few years older than him. We had to pay them direct, so no worry about checks or anything. We also employed our older daughter (by 13 years) who no longer lived at our home. To do this we had to become her employer which mean paying her with proper wage slips, Nat insurance, paying tax, holiday pay, sickness pay and insuring her. We had to have a proper contract and then when she had a baby we had to pay maternity benefit. Luckily there was a group called Equal Lives which I think was set up partly by Disabled people and the local Council to help people employing their own care help. Don't know how I would have managed it all without them, even then we still had lots of paper work, had to fill in monthly accounts, paid the tax direct to the Tax people etc. I was quite relived when we found him a place in Residential care especially as having to pay a pension was just coming into force and would have meant even more paper work. Plus of course if you didn't get tax paid on time you could be fined. I would think carefully before employing anyone myself as there is a lot more to it than we think-if you do it legally of course and if you don't there can be other repercussions.

Your Mum would have to have all the employment rights in place as she would be deemed as an employer. This means she would have give holiday pay and agree to a pension if her carers want it. Tax and NI have to be paid as and when it is deducted. If they get pregnant, there is the maternity pay to cover. If she employs over a certain number she will need the various contracts in place. If she does not do this and the tax people find out, she will be liable for the back tax. My daughter has been employing her carers and it is a nightmare for the person who has to administer it.

This happened with my Mum who had a carer who told her long sob stories about her family difficulties, mainly revolving round lack of cash. The carer went in twice a day as we lived at a distance and rapidly built up a lot of influence over Mum. I then found out that she was selling Mum drawings she had done of Mum's garden and dogs. They were dreadful amateur things and she was charging a fortune. Next it was special scarves she was selling, then pot plants and finally a suggestion that Mum employ her direct cash-in-hand. At that point I installed myself in Mum's house for a visit and had 'words', including telling the carer that I would be obliged to report the matter to the agency if it happened again. Two weeks later the woman said her car had broken down so she was being reassigned to an area near her house. Mum was sad to lose a familiar face, but as it happened the replacement was much nicer.