Do my parents have to become employers?

[SybilEsmeGytha]

Wrote a big message and lost it so will try to be more concise!

Can anyone with more experience tell me if there is a way to have an informal arrangement with an ex-enablement carer ( previously sourced via the council as part a care plan although parents pay in full fir this). Parents now want drop the remaining element of the care plan and arrange support now on a private basis without having to go through all the rigmarole of becoming an 'employer', insurance etc.

Context wise one parent now provides all actual care needed by the other parent, no 'care' visits take place outside of enablement sessions. The enablement worker, who has become a friend, is retiring from formal employment but would like to continue to take my parent out and about for a couple of hours a week with her expenses covered. This suits our family however the council have suggested a baffling amount of paperwork has to be done to do this legally? Is becoming their employer absolutely the only way we can continue this arrangement privately? We don't do this with a private physio that works with my parent once a week and I can't get my head around why this different or what business it is of the councils.

I can't get up to my parents to get a good look at the paperwork until Xmas (200miles away) so would appreciate any experience or pointers that can be shared in the meantime. Thank you!

Is it something to do with the insurance required for a carer to be able to take your DP out?

Yes I believe insurance was mentioned. Does that mean anyone other than mum has to have insurance to take my dad where he wants to go? The oversight I, or the enablement worker who has become their friend, gives is to direct him for safe transfer from car to chair and back again. The enablement worker is an ex district nurse if that makes any difference.

The enablement worker needs to be self employed and have his/her own insurance.

Could the enablement worker consider being self-employed? Though may then be required themselves to have appropriate insurance, Council registration, DBS, etc. Depends if they want to offer services to anyone else in future as to whether that bureaucracy is worth their while, I guess.

Anyone who is paid to do it needs insurance.

They enablement worker is only intending to maintain friendship/support with my parents and one other child she works with. No.more than 12 hours a week. They are retiring from the care agency as they won't stop pushing her to do more hours than she's comfortable with. I'm not sure she'd be willing to go self employed.

I'm sensing from everyones questions we may have go down the route of becoming her employer to maintain her support. Can anyone give me a view on if this is as complicated or as onerous as I'm hearing from mum who's understandably feeling a tad overwhelmed?

I believe that if your parents want to become her employer they’ll need to register as employers with HMRC, run a payroll and pay her tax and NI.

They’ll need to pay her at least national minimum wage, check if she’s legally allowed to work in the UK, they will have to get employers liability insurance, write her up a contract with terms and conditions, and apply for a DBS check for her.

They may need to enrol her in the workplace penaion scheme and pay her travel expenses, sick pay and annual leave pay.

And depending on what type of employee she turns out to be, they might end up needing to pay for the services of a HR consultant.

It will be much easier to hire a new private carer/support worker who is already set up as self employed, if this lady is not willing to be self employed.

Alternatively this lady could continue to do what she’s been doing, as a “friend”, and your parents bung her an envelope of cash every month or so, however this blurs any boundaries and has the potential to go wrong in all kinds of ways.

Difficulty we've got is it took the care agency 6 months to find a consistent and effective enablement worker. There's real fear from my parents that they won't be replaceable in terms of capability and rapport. I worry about carer breakdown for mum if that happened.

I definitely hear those concerns about boundaries being blurred and recognise that my parents are quite vulnerable. Unfortunately there's no other family to support apart from me and it's not possible for me to move closer.

I think there may be an option to use a payroll company the council have recommended. Has anyone ever gone down that route?

A friend of mine used a third party called Penderels, she received funding from the local authority to pay for a carer, in the form of direct payments.

The enabler needs to go self employed. It isn't difficult and insurance wise she can get cover for about £6 a month.
She will need to register as self employed and provide a basic invoice (just buy a cheap invoice book and fill out)
It really isn't difficult it sounds scarier than it is. You're welcome to pm me. I'm a self employed carer and have been for several years