Moving to digital-based administration has, for some time, seemed like a luxury rather than a necessity, very understandable, change can seem difficult and there are many perceptions around new systems: –
- A computer system will cost money, which will need to be taken from a budget somewhere, can we afford it?
- Care Home operators are unique, how can any generic admin system cope with the practices and compliance requirements of a busy care home?
- Technology changes quickly, constantly upgrading, how do you choose the best system for you, how do you ‘future proof’?,
- There are always hidden costs, on new hardware and equipment, on future upgrades
- Our staff aren’t particularly IT literate, will it take months to train staff?
- What if staff don’t like it, or won’t use it?
The reticence to go digital is understandable, all of the above are valid concerns. What should not be understated is the incredible efficiencies the use of a new system can bring to a business.
Lockdown saw the world shift (near painlessly) online to stay in touch, video chat is now standard practice in UK industry and education, and the care sector was no exception; forums, webinars, online training, association and group video conferencing, all digital, all new for 2020. Would any of us want to go back to the old ways of conference calls and hrs of driving for a 1 hr meeting? No way no sir!
We all know the care home sector is driven by the person-centred ethos, a personal touch and hands-on resident care, the digital transformation of the care planning side of operations has seen hours of time saved per resident, meaning more time to care, less time on paperwork, ease of reporting and enhanced compliance. Not a single operator that uses care planning software would ever consider going back to pen and paper.
So maybe going digital isn’t all bad?
what is care home administration?
Here there are a number of options, use a care home management system for part or all of the administration tasks, most choose to go all in rather than stay half digital and half paper. Choosing a system that is specifically designed for the residential care sector is a great start, Care homes are multi-site, multi-brand businesses, they need super flexible rotas, easy-to-use staff cover options, minimal training and easy-to-adopt.
Added areas such as finance and billing of the complex local authority fee contracts, top-ups, private payers, and billable extras, all sent to multiple parties, an area unique to the private care sector as such are the challenges faced in using a system can only be overcome by an all-encompassing system specific to care home administration.
- CoolCare ticks all of the boxes and then some, it’s made for the care sector by people from the care sector, it’s cloud-hosted and is continuously developed and enhanced every 2 weeks, accessible from any web-enabled device means no need for specialist IT infrastructure.
- CoolCare is built with efficiency in mind, Intelligent clocking in ‘snaps staff to shift’ this means staff are paid for when they are supposed to be there, not when they arrive early, leave late etc.
- On average, CoolCare4 automatically adjusts shifts by 34 minutes – that’s about £4.69 saved per shift. 26 shifts per day, 365 days a year, £44,358 saved.
So rather than costing money, CoolCare pays for itself multiple times over.
Care homes are experiencing an uptick in enquiries, so having complete visibility across your pipeline is essential. The CoolCare4 system allows easy access across teams, to the current enquiry pipeline, which could mean managers, dedicated sales and marketing staff or CFOs and MD’s. Digital = Transparent.
Enquiries can be tracked from the first call to conversion, meaning that no one slips through the net. Customer feedback shows that having an active pipeline management system reduces enquiry to resident conversion to under 25 days and sees an increase in average fees by 6-8%
With more residents, comes more new staff and onboarding in a compliant, timely manner is critical. CoolCare digitises staff onboarding allowing reports to be run to check for outstanding documentation, it also makes it easy to see training and supervision records in an instant means that both new staffs can be tracked through their induction while ensuring that current staff maintain their training record. If anyone were to ask, (say an inspector) a report can be printed in seconds.
One of the rising concerns with a return to normality is the administrative burden that comes with managing annual leave. Holiday management is a complex timetabling issue that is made dramatically more efficient with CoolCare4 software. Care homes already using the system are reporting that CoolCare4 delivers a time saving of 1.5 hours per staff member per year. Across a staff of 80, that generates a saving of 120 hours or 10 days of admin time.
More importantly, CoolCare provides an audit trail of ALL holiday requests, holiday requests denied and staff member goes sick on the very same day. Irrefutable evidence is very helpful in these situations.
Adopting new technology is not as time-consuming or as complex as you might think. CoolCare’s training and customer support staff are always on hand to help your staff get up to speed quickly. Don’t believe us? Have a look at our care home management software companies’ review on Reviews.io. There you will see what people have to say about our service.
