Carers Hourly Rates

MrHappy
MrHappy Online Community Member Posts: 177 Empowering
in Families and carers

Checking rates for private carers on the Curam homecare lists the cheapest carers i can find in my area are £20 per hour but most are around £25-£30 per hour. With the national minimum wage currently set at £12.21p are some carers pricing themselves out of employment because at £25ph that's double the minimum wage.

Comments

  • Kimi87
    Kimi87 Online Community Member Posts: 8,471 Championing
    edited January 5

    Perhaps instead the carers are placing an appropriate value on their labour for the type of job they do?

    Carers will also need to factor in travel costs into the hourly rate they charge.

    There is also a national shortage of carers, so this allows them to set a higher amount they will work for, than national minimum wage.

  • MrHappy
    MrHappy Online Community Member Posts: 177 Empowering
    edited January 5

    @Kimi87 I agree being a carer is a tough job but so is working in a supermarket. Historically carers have been undervalued both in terms of salary and a wider recognition from society but the official stats confirm the vast majority of carers in the UK remain designated as unskilled labour even after they have completed a short carer's induction course.

  • MW123
    MW123 Scope Member Posts: 1,998 Championing

    Self employed carers do not keep the £20 to £30 an hour they charge. That money has to cover everything an employer would normally pay for.

    They have to fund their own travel, fuel, time between visits, holidays, sick pay, training, DBS checks, liability insurance, pensions, tax, NI, and all the admin that comes with arranging contracts and invoicing for clients.

    Once all that is taken off, their actual earnings are much closer to supermarket wages, just without the guaranteed hours or paid holiday that employees get when they work for companies.

    So saying carers are pricing themselves out of work feels a little bit harsh. Most people are happy to pay a fair rate if it means getting reliable, experienced support. Good care is worth paying for.

    And the unskilled label is simply a government category, not a fair reflection of how demanding the job really is.

  • MrHappy
    MrHappy Online Community Member Posts: 177 Empowering

    On the Curam Homecare lists pretty much all the self employed carers have loads of availability which probably indicates clients are reluctant to pay such high hourly rates.

    If carers, plumbers, mechanics or any other group choose to be self employed then increase their rates accordingly to cover added costs such as travel or sick pay etc then its likely many clients will choose to go with an agency where hourly rates for similar quality of care are more reasonable.

  • tom_wilson1
    tom_wilson1 Online Community Member Posts: 4 Listener

    It’s easy to compare it to minimum wage, but private care rates usually reflect a lot more than just the carer’s hourly pay. that fee often has to cover travel time, fuel, insurance, training, admin, gaps between visits, and the fact that many carers are self-employed without sick pay or holiday pay. So £25 an hour doesn’t mean they’re taking home anything close to that.

    In many cases it’s less about pricing themselves out, and more about covering the real cost of providing reliable one-to-one care.

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