hi chrissie

I have direct payments- I employ 3 people during the wk. I decide who and we work the hrs between us.

As long as they earn £90 a wk or less each you dont have to work out the tax for them and it is easy peasy.

I would say for most elderly people it is one complication too many and they get a firm in to manage it. If there is someone in the family or is close who can manage it for them then this is fine as long as they are trustworthy etc.

The scheme is brilliant for me.

They will need to contact adult services at social services and ask for a care needs assessment. They will want to push direct payments as it saves the council a fortune but in fact I find it works much much better.

I have a copy of the contract I use for my employees and then I just do a wages slip each month.

Jenni xx

hi Jenni and Marie thanks for Ans

This care firm is compleatley useless and i have told them on the phone more then once .Ha ha I can,t see who i am speaking to so i say it .
we just use them for meds and they can,t do that right .

Jenni i am interrestested in these payments sounds a much better idea ,Thanks for info .I would like to choise who gos in .And what they do .
Me with R.A can do whats needed in less then a hour and compleatley done for day .Ss are useless the firm we have from them useless .

Crossroads fine but claim they can,t do whatever in a certain time ha ha me i can do it quicker that that with R.A .It makes me laugh .this care lark

but now they will be 92 and 93 very soon ( same week ) Changes are going too be quick now so we need good care in with every thing done .It does not take long .
christine

I do direct payments too, but don't get to choose who I have to actually do the caring................so the dream of a girl I have to cook me a daily dinner is actually having cookery lessons ..............from me
I did ask for some choice but that is NOT an option round here, you get who there is, and not always the same girl each time, from what friends say!! But I insisted on direct payments and like Jenni, I just keep a record of her hours and they can check with her then.

ps: So far we've made some pretty palatable meals and she is really amazed that it is possible to MAKE meals and not just buy stuff from the chippy!!! It would be funny if it wasn't so sad!!

I had carers when I had no hip. At first Social Services instructed a local care agency to send carers out, but then they offered me Self-Directed Support which I trialled using the same Agency with a view to moving on to Direct Payments.

Social Services allocate a budget based on the number of hours care needed, then you can either hold the money in a separate account yourself and advertise for a carer(s), employ them yourself, do their wages etc. etc., or employ an agency to send out staff. In my area, there is an organisation who will do the wages for you and offer support, i.e. employment disputes etc., for a weekly fee of about £6.50. I believe public liability insurance is paid by Social Services/County Council. The guy that came out to see me about doing wages etc. suggested firing the carer before you've employed them for a year, so as to avoid them gaining too many employment rights, i.e. redundancy.

In theory, it sounded good, but as others have said, its difficult to find a carer that does the job properly. Mine was ok but often didn't stay the allocated 45 or 30 minutes, didn't want to do any housework, which they were told to do under SDS, turned up an hour late and basically weren't worth the hassle. Communication between Agency and staff was non-existent. If I cancelled them, they would turn up anyway and no-one ever knew what was going on. In the end I told them I would try on my own and I'm now glad to be rid of them.

The place to find out more would be your County Council website as each County does things slightly differently.