Care home no longer providing toiletries.

Bless you for trying to do your best for him. It must be so hard. I know that times are tough, but what do the home do in cases where a resident has literally no-one? They surely have to face that situation. I can see that they might make a charge to his 'account'/package for them but surely they have a duty of care to provide in cases where there is no supporting friend or family.

Can you push back and say that you're sorry but you can't afford to buy his toiletries and sundries as well as your own?

Best wishes. x

Do you mean they don’t sort out specific toiletries - like a particular brand of toothpaste or cream - or they don’t supply any?
The latter would be a disgrace and I’d want to talk to management before escalating to the CQC.

They will be able to keep a portion of their pension or benefits each month, after any contributions they have to make towards care costs.

You will be able to ask the home to purchase toiletries on his behalf and the cost can be taken from his personal funds.

We have always had to provide them for mum and they also have a really overpriced shop

He should be allowed a small amount of money to purchase personal items such a toiletries, sweets, stamps, a newspaper etc, but whether anybody will bother to buy them for him is another matter. I have never come across a care home that provided toiletries though, the residents always had to buy them.

Who has poa / apoiteeship for his finances?

@Toddlerteaplease I think you just need to tell the care home staff bluntly that you are a friend, not a relative, and as such you aren't responsible for his care. They need to sort it out, either with his family or, if his family aren't prepared to be involved, then using whatever protocols they would use to ensure the proper care/provisioning of residents who have no family to pick up the slack. They must have other residents who don't have someone external to take responsibility for this stuff.

Don't take on more than you're comfortable with. It never ends.

What happens for people who have no relative but are incapable of purchasing themselves? Presumably the staff do it and it gets added to the bill.

I mean they can't just let someone fester with no toothpaste or soap.

Same if you were going on a round the world trip or going in to hospital.

Find out what happens in this situation and get it set up for your friend.

The trouble with these situations is that people (by which I mean social services, care homes, uninsterested family) don't do anything unless they have to. If a friend or a family member will take on any care aspect then they get stuck with it.

So the key thing is not to start in the first place if you feel you can't or don't want to - which in your position is perfectly reasonable. I mean someone is paying the care home for him whehter that is private or the tax payer - the least they can do for the money is make sure the resident is hygenic.

Iv known many care homes where this is standard. Often residents with no family would have staff buying things out of their own pocket through pure good will. Sad.

if you don't feel you could manage directly heading the subject on directly
you could tell a little white lie either to the son or the care home and say you won't be able to visit for a while as you will be away/for personal reasons and so he/they need to make arrangements going forward.

I worked in care homes back in the 90's and residents had to buy their own toiletries then. They are allowed to keep some money so they come out of that. For residents who had no families the keyworker for that resident was responsible for getting them and claiming it back

Be honest with the care home. My gran was 400 miles away from her nearest relative, so her ‘spends’ money was collected & given to the home each fortnight when we’d go in turns to visit her. They then used it to purchase personal care items/for resident trips as needed, and would provide receipts for items/money spent. They did offer to have her ‘spend’ allowance transferred directly to them if needed or there was a problem with visits.

Dad (who died last year) also had to use his money left over from his care fee deduction for personal care items, which was fine as we were local to his home, but they too offered a service to buy personal care items from an allowance transferred each month. Some care homes may offer this, some may not.

Both care facilities were fabulous about discussing issues with care & relationships, so please don’t be worried that they will judge you or think badly if you hold your hands up & say you don’t want to do his shopping anymore.

@Toddlerteaplease does your friend have capacity? I know you're trying to do a kind thing with his money, but please stop. Tell the care home he has no one to manage his finances and it will be done under apointeeship to the local authority. The care home will then provide his toiletries and add it to his bill. I would hate for you to get in shit for doing a kind thing.

For those who do not have families who regularly come in can arrange to get toiletries but the client needs to pay. This was already the case in some places. We used to send supplies every few weeks via Amazon

My stepfather is in a similar position. His home does provide toiletries but I also bulk buy better quality shampoo, soap, deodorant, toothpaste and razors. I take a bag in every few months.

Mum's first placement provided all toiletries and made it very clear that I didn't need to be bringing toothpaste, that was part of their service. The next home didn't provide anything but didn't tell me this until they'd charged her personal account some ridiculous sum for a bottle of bodywash.

You can make it clear where your boundaries are - you aren't responsible for providing toiletries, clothing or an escort to appointments. It's easier not to start than to back out once you have started.

MIL has a child and a sibling but the home came to me asking if I'd do hospital escort duty because I'm the regular visitor. I've done more than my share of this in the past but I don't want the responsibility of it now so I said no. They can ask you, you can say no. You don't have to justify it or make excuses, "no" will do.

Care home’s don’t generally provide toiletries. Is it self funding? If so they can add to bill ,speak to the home ,tell son to take responsibility or do a one off order from Amazon .

I’d be tempted to do a one off supermarket delivery to him with a year’s supply of all he needs if you have access to his funds.

He should have a keyworker who would either take him on a personal shop, or purchase anything needed on his behalf (during work time, nobody should be using their own time or money to look after residents).
There is a small amount set apart from pension/benefits to act as a personal allowance to each resident that is ringfenced from being taken towards fees, think it's about £20/30 a week, so they should be able to fund toiletries, magazines, personal snacks etc.

I think I’d do this for an ex boyfriend, tbh. Just get a big delivery from Boots.

But I appreciate that it doesn’t solve the real problem. Which will get bigger as he gets older and potentially loses capacity/needs more support. When/if this starts happening you would need to be assertive.