The Hidden Cost of Low Pay in the Social Care Sector
Last week’s Joseph Rowntree Foundation report identified the genuine cost of paying adult social care workers low salaries. Social care workers not only feel the impact of lower salaries themselves; paying lower salaries negatively impacts the entire social care sector, not least elderly residential care. The conclusions identified in this report are not, however, a surprise to us. At Jasmine, prioritising our team members has always been central to our mission, not only to benefit of our team members, but ultimately, our residents. We believe a happy and motivated team is a pre-requisite to happy residents.
Failing to prioritise adult social care workers results in severe consequences for care home providers. Lower pay is identified in this report as a significant cause of team turnover. The direct financial costs of high team turnover rates among care home providers are well known, including those relating to recruitment, training, and using agency staff. However, as this report illustrates, the costs of lower salaries extend beyond these. The cost of team turnover extends to the time taken recruiting, onboarding and training new team members, managing the care of our existing residents with less permanent members, and an inability to take on new residents until turnover is stabilised. The average total lost output cost per care worker vacancy identified by this report, including the time taken to recruit and to train a care worker, is an eyewatering £9,282.13. For the care sector, aiming to pay adult social care workers as little as possible is a false economy in the long run.
At Jasmine, we prioritise our team members and reward their hard work from day one. We pay top percentile salaries, based on benchmarking of all local homes. Paying higher salaries demonstrates our commitment to our team members by offering security, stability, and by recognising their value. Furthermore, team members can go on to earn a pay increase through our yearly performance-related pay review and appraisal process. Our appraisal process scores our team members on how well they exemplify our Jasmine Values, and whether they are delivering the highest standards of care. Any team member reaching the highest appraisal grade can earn up to an additional 12% on top of their top percentile basic salary. This prospect fosters loyalty and cohesion, in turn helping to reduce turnover.
The steps taken to prioritise our team members, however, do not stop there. Jasmine offers substantial benefits and incentives to motivate, thank and reward our team members across all our homes. Notably, we use a rewards platform, Bonusly, to reward our team members for a wide range of accomplishments, including training, birthdays and anniversaries, long service milestones, and ambassadorship actions. Team members can also reward each other to provide meaningful peer-to-peer recognition. In Jasmine providing rewards for specific achievements or for embodying our values, we demonstrate celebrating exceptional effort and reinforce a positive culture of excellence, while also providing a boost to salaries.
On top of our salaries and rewards platform, we pay up to an extra £3.00 per hour to team members that complete additional shifts picked up at less than 24 hours’ notice, recognising their part in helping us to avoid high agency usage. We offer interest-free loans to our team members for times of hardship, and loans to purchase bicycles for local travel. Crucially, we also front all costs of NVQ training courses and pay tax-fee incentives of up to £300 upon completion. In doing so, Jasmine provides team members the opportunity for professional development without worrying about the cost, demonstrating commitment in their long-term growth, and our homes retain highly qualified carers.
Team turnover is costly for any business, but in elderly residential care, the costs are felt by our residents too. High team turnover results in a loss of trust and emotional security for our residents, especially those with dementia. Consistent and familiar faces in care builds trust and allows carers to learn and understand personal preferences that are crucial to person-centred care. High team turnover can lead to anxiety and confusion for vulnerable residents. Furthermore, high team turnover can disrupt the continuity of care provided, as permanent teams are able to develop extensive knowledge of a resident’s medical history and personal preferences, allowing them to notice early warning signs of health changes. When team members leave, that vital informal knowledge and rapport leaves with them, negatively affecting our resident’s standard of care. To prioritise our team members is an investment not only in our people, but in our elderly residents as well.
The Joseph Rowntree Foundation’s report into hidden costs of low pay in the social care sector demonstrates that, inversely, paying social care workers lower salaries is costly to the sector, to providers, to team members themselves, and to those in our care. Paying high salaries, offering rewards, covering the cost of training; these all require time and money. But for Jasmine, they are worth every penny. While it may appear expensive to provide higher salaries, the cost is worth the investment in the long-term. As outlined, Jasmine goes beyond simply offering higher salaries to our team members, also offering benefits and incentives to ensure our teams feel rewarded for their invaluable work. For Jasmine, this report serves to affirm our mission:
“By prioritising our people, our mission is to provide the highest standards of care, to as many elderly residents as possible.”