Direct Payment Scheme: A Guide to Employing Your Own Personal Assistant
Adult Social Care
Choosing and Purchasing Team
DIRECT PAYMENT:
A Guide to Employing Your Own Personal Assistant
This document identifies areas of employment. You should contact either MSL on 0161 603 2167 or ACAS to discuss specific employment related issues. Telephone: 0300 123 1100
Alternatively contact:
Choosing and Purchasing Team
Stockport Metropolitan Borough Council
Stopford House, 4th Floor
Piccadilly
Stockport
SK1 3XE
Tel: 0161 218 1953
Email:choosing&
Guide to abbreviations used in this document:
ACAS- Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service
CIPD- Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development
DBS- Disclosure & Barring Service
DP- Direct Payments
DPSS- Direct Payments Support Service
DTI- Department of Trade and Industry
HMRC- Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs
HSE- Health and Safety Executive
NCIL- National Centre for Independent living
NICs- National Insurance Contributions
CONTENTS
ARECRUITMENTPage number
A.1Deciding the Typeof Person You Want 4
A.2Advertising 5
A.3Interviews 6
A.4Selection10
A.5References10
A.6Staff Rotas11
BJOB DESCRIPTIONS/PERSON SPECIFICATION
B.1Why Have a Job Description for Your Employees?12
B.2What to Include in Your Job Description13
B.3Sample Job Description15
B.4Sample Person Specification17
CWRITING YOUR JOB ADVERT
C.1Include the Essentials19
C.2How to Contact You 19
C.3Genuine Occupational Qualifications19
C.4Race Discrimination19
C.5Sex Discrimination 19
C.6Age Discrimination20
C.7Sexual Orientation Discrimination20
C.8Religious Belief Discrimination20
DJOB APPLICATION FORMS
D.1What to Include22
D.2Sample Job Application Form from ACAS23
EPROBATIONARY PERIOD
E.1Why Have a Probationary Period?26
FINDUCTION
F.1What is Induction for?27
GCONTRACTS
G.1What is a Contract of Employment?28
G.2 Sample Contract of Employment 29
G.4Equal Opportunities34
HSELF EMPLOYMENT
H.1Employed or Self-Employed?35
IWAGES, TAX, NATIONAL INSURANCE AND BENEFITS
I.1Tax and National Insurance Contributions37
I.2Sick Pay38
I.3Pay and Time Off Work for Parents39
I.4Details of Other Benefits41
JEMPLOYER’S INSURANCE
J.1Employer’s Insurance42
KUSING A CAR
K.1Car Insurance43
K.2Vehicle Checks43
K.3Checklist44
LTRAINING
L.1Staff Training45
L.2Training proforma46
MHEALTH AND SAFETY
M.1A Guide to Health and Safety48
M.2Personal Protective Equipment48
NWEBSITES
O.1Websites49
ARECRUITMENT
Finding the right staff to work for you is likely to be the most crucial aspect of making Direct Payments successful for you.
When recruiting you will need to consider:
- The type of person you want?
- How and where to advertise?
- Interviewing for staff.
- How to select the best candidate?
A.1Deciding the Type of Person You Want
Deciding on the type of person you want will depend on the job you are employing them to do. There may be specific skills involved, such as driving, or it may be that there are personal qualities that are important to you, e.g. a sense of humour.
Try listing all the tasks that will need to be done and then decide what kind of person is needed. For example:
Is the age of the person important? (You must consider Equal Opportunities
Legislation)
Are there a lot of very repetitive tasks, which will require patience?
Will you expect the person to be able to think for themselves so that some initiativeis needed?
Is the sex of the person important? (Be careful though with this latter point or youcould contravene the Equal Opportunities Legislation. If you prove that the sex of the person is needed for the job, e.g. you are a woman and wish to have a woman to do personal tasks such as assisting with personal care, this is acceptable, butyou cannot otherwise simply specify a preference. This would be against the law)
You should then end up with two lists:
The tasks to be done.
The skills and personal qualities you are looking for in your Personal Assistant(s).
A.2Advertising
Once you have made your lists then you need to decide how you are going to find the right staff. There are many ways of doing this; some are more successful than others and some cost more than others.
Word of mouth
Knowing someone you would like to work for you is obviously the best way, but another similar way is to ask people you trust if they know anyone who would be interested.
Local Post Office or Shop
This has the advantage of reaching people who live near you. This can be helpful in that, arrangements with people can often be more flexible and, if they are not relying on transport to reach you, they are less likely to let you down through travelling difficulties. It is also very inexpensive to put a small advertisement in the shop window. Remember to find out how much it costs and put down a closing date.
Newspaper
The Choosing and Purchasing Team can give you contact numbers and example prices of placing an advertisement in a variety of publications.
Job Centre
They will advertise for you, free of charge, and will often give you help with writing up an advertisement and in giving you a room to hold the interviews in. Feedback from clients about the quality of candidates has been mixed. Some have been good others not. One problem is that the Job Centre has targets to meet in finding people work and they may well put people your way whom they have had difficulty placing. Also, if you rely on this method alone you will not include people already in work.
Most of these ways of finding staff require you to draw up an advertisement. This should be as simple as possible with just the basic information. Remember to include a closing date.
Example:
Person required to help with domestic tasksfor disabled woman.
10 hours per week
£7.50 per hour.
Telephone 0161 123 4567
Closing Date for application: March 2017
The Choosing and Purchasing Team can make funds available to assist clients with advertising.
You can then discuss the job in more detail with anyone who telephones. It is a good idea to have the Job Descriptionand the Person Specificationwritten out and you can then send these to people who are interested.
Caution: For safety reasons it is important not to give out your address to people at this stage. The Choosing and Purchasing Team can make arrangements to receive your recruitment mail and to provide office facilities so that you can interview away from your home.
You will then need to decide how to get the information you want from your applicants. There are two main ways.
Either:
- You can get them to write to you saying why they are interested in the position, sending you a Curriculum Vitae
or
- You can get them to complete an Application Form. There is a sample of a simple form attached to these notes for you to use if you wish.
A.3Interviews
Generally, it is not a good idea to interview people in your own home. Many Job Centres have rooms where you can interview applicants but you will need to book the room in advance. The Choosing and Purchasing Team can also assist you by providing rooms to interview in. Interviews generally take between 20-30 minutes. You should leave some time between them to have a break and discuss your impressions.
It is a good idea to ask someone to assist you with interviewing. There are several good reasons for doing this:
It is good to have someone who you can discuss your impressions of applicants with
You may need someone to assist you with taking notes
It can also help you to remain in control of the situation
The Choosing and Purchasing Teamcan offer advice on suitable places to hold interviews and will also be available to assist with interviewing if required.
The interview is the only time you have to determine the personality of the applicant. It might be useful to conduct the interview in an informal way, maybe over a cup of coffee, as a good way of judging if you like the applicant. The main thing is that you feel comfortable with the whole process.
Remember that at the interview you want to:
Find out if the person is suitable for the job
Get extra information about their skills and experience
Find out more about them, what they think, and how they will copewith new situations
Find out why they want to do this job for you
You also have to explain what the job is about, its terms, rules and what you expect.
Explain to applicants about the hours you want them to work, and find out if they are able to work unsociable hours e.g. Bank Holiday, weekends and evenings etc.
Do not offer the job to any candidate until you have interviewed everyone, as there may be a better applicant later on. The most important thing is that you use an interview process that you find comfortable, and remember that the Choosing and Purchasing Team is here to help you.
General Tips
Try and give as positive an impression as you can at all times.
Using an applicant’s name throughout the interview is a good technique. If you address them simply as ‘you’ all the time, they may well feel that you haven’t got their name and this may discourage them from opening up.
Be prepared to go into detail about your personal requirements at the interview stage and to answer any questions they have. Asking applicants to read the Job Description will help to make it clear what is expected of them.
Explain your disability – Outline a “typical day” and the type of work that they would be expected to do as detailed in your Job Description.
Before the interview you should prepare a set of questions to ask each applicant. You should ask all the applicants the same questions in roughly the same order and devise a way of scoring the answers you get (maybe 0-5 depending on how well they answer). Interviewing like this will give everyone an equal chance, and enable you to select the best person for the job.
Finishing the Interview
Check your list of questions to make sure that you have all the information you want before you let the applicant go. There is no reason why you should not look at the list of points that you made before the interview. Do this openly, explaining what you are doing to the applicant. You may then ask them if there are any questions they want to ask.
Thank the person for their time and explain when they are likely to hear from you.
State whether you will write to them or inform them verbally.
Explain if you have more people to interview.
Interview Checklist
Arrange a venue
If required arrange assistance with interviewing
List interview questions
Plan the length of interview
Concluding the interview
Questions
An interview is an exchange of information,therefore, it is important to listen and give the person a chance to speak and ask clear questions.
Don’t assume anything, whether in terms of giving or getting information.
Examples:
Explain about the job. Now that you’ve seen the Job Description, do you have any questions?
I see that you don’t have direct experience of this kind of work, but people oftenhave other experience. For example, some people have members of their family, or friends, or maybe neighbours who are disabled in one way or another. What experience of working with disabled people do you have?
I will need to tell you how to do things in the way I want them done. How do you think you would cope with this?
How would you react if you have done something and I want it done again in another way?
What if I ask you to do something, and you think there is another way to do it that you would prefer? What would you do?
If we did have a difference of opinion, how do you think you would deal with this?
What qualities and experience do you have that you think would make you a good Personal Assistant?
Would you be interested if there is any training available?
Have you been on any relevant training courses? If so, what & when?
Would you be prepared to consider being called on at short notice to do more than your usual hours, e.g. if another Personal Assistant goes off sick?
What shifts would you prefer e.g. days, nights or a mixture?
What are your hobbies/interests?
Do you have a car? Would you be prepared to use it for work?
If relevant you should ask why they are leaving, or have left, their current or last job.
You should mention any other things you enjoy doing such as gardening, socialising and ask if the Personal Assistant would be prepared to do this as part of their job?
If you have pets you should mention them. Some people have allergies and could not work with pets.
Would you be prepared to consider part-time or relief work?
Any questions you’d like to ask me?
Concluding the interview
You should also explain the following:
Pay and conditions and any rota system you have worked out in advance
Contracts of Employment
When/how the applicant will hear if successful or not
That you will take up references for the applicant prior to appointment (assuming you have not done so prior to interview)
Advise that if successful relevant Disclosure Barring Certificates (previously known as Criminal Records Bureau checks) may be obtained out prior to commencement. Ask The Choosing and Purchasing Team for clarification
A.4Selection
Having interviewed all your applicants how do you select? It is best to check two points:
- Can they actually do the job or will they be able to with a bit of guidance from
you? Are you sure about this – check the evidence from the Application Form and the interview
- Are they the kind of person you want, are you going to be able to get along with them? This will form the basis of a good working relationship
In other words does your candidate match up to the two lists you made at the beginning? Ideally the best match should be the best candidate.
A.5References
Checking the references an applicant has given is very important because it is the only way you can be sure that the information they have provided is correct. It is also valuable to have the opinion of another person who already knows the applicant and about their suitability for the job.
Contacting the Referees
Each applicant should have given the name and address of two people who are prepared to give him or her a reference on their Application Form. It is important that the first reference they give you is their last employer. They should also have stated whether you can take up the references before the interview.
The usual time to take up references is after you have interviewed because then you should know who you would prefer to offer the job to. Taking up references before interview is not normally a good idea because of the effort and time involved in getting references for everyone.
Requesting a Reference in Writing
Asking for a written reference is the best way of getting the most information. You can ask specific questions and also send a copy of the Job Description so you are sure that the referee (the person giving the reference) understands what the job involves.
The drawbacks are that it may take longer for the referee to reply, so you may have to wait longer before the person can start if they are suitable.
Do not accept written references given to you by the applicant on behalf of someone else without verifying that they were indeed written by a past employer.
Requesting a Reference by Telephone
Simply contacting the referee by telephone may seem like a quicker way of checking if someone is suitable. Referees may also be prepared to say things over the telephone, which they would not write down. On the other hand, a quick telephone call may not allow the referee to think about what the job involves.
The best advice that can be given is to have the best of both worlds by requesting a reference by letter and then following it up with a telephone call.
A.6Staff Rotas
What you need to consider:
your assessment – how many Direct Payments hours you have
your budget – remember Tax and National Insurance deductions
how many staff you need – remember you may need cover
what hours your staff will work / what shift patterns
whether your rotas will be fixed or rotating
Working Time Directive Legislation
Minimum Wage Legislation
Options
If you have more Personal Assistants working shorter hours:
you have the possibility of more cover if anyone is ill or on holiday
they may be under Tax and NI thresholds, allowing more care hours
But:
it may be more difficult to recruit suitable people for a small number of hours
more employees means more organisation and more administration
this might make rotas more complicated
this will mean more shift changes which may affect how you want to organise your own life