Care Worker Jobs (Sevacare)

I personally don't work in care but I know someone who does. Your hours will be long. Depending on where you're actually working, your hours can vary dramatically. In a residential home you might need to do sleep shifts which are paid more but do wear you out quite quickly. Other than that I hear the work is extremely rewarding (unfortunately not in the financial sense) unless you become a qualified nurse or doctor.

Hi I have been working as a full time home carer for the elderly for the last 18 months since I came home from uni having got myself in a state not completed my dissertation and basically failed my degree :-(. I had been doing it part time for a few months towards the end of uni and I didn't know what to do with myself when I got back so I took another job doing the same here since I did enjoy it and there were plenty of jobs available with an ageing population to care for. Generally I do enjoy the job but I will say it is absolutely exhausting too. I start at 7 am every morning which means leaving at 6 20-640 depending on where I am scheduled to start and at least couple of days a week I work through till 9 30pm, sometimes 10pm. If i'm lucky get a break of 1-2 hours in the middle of the afternoon after lunches and before teas. I have to work every other weekend too so I do saturday daytime and sunday evening although sometimes im aloud to swap this around. You can cover an awful lot of miles in this job. I can drive well over 100 miles in a day going between clients, in the last 12 days I have driven just short of 900 miles and my company pays just 22p per mile which just about covers petrol costs but not the wear and tear on my car. Our planners at the moment are rubbish though and keep sending us all out to the same areas at the same time to do different clients instead of getting one person to see to the people in that area. Not a very green firm! The towns and villages we go to are quite spread out too and we are given 5 minutes to get between clients which means that to fit them all in we often to have to rush and cut the call times down and use the time we save for travelling which is sad sometimes when you wish you could stay and have a chat after you've completed your tasks. We are also short staffed due to the high turnover of staff and so i'm constantly getting calls from the office asking if I can squeeze in clients who are miles away from those on my rota or pick up extra runs on my evenings off. This past week I have worked 5 evenings out of 7 and have been up every morning. We are paid £8 on a weekday and £9 on a weekend which is better than some other companies in the area but do cover a wide and quite rural area and we are not paid extra for overtime. I think they pay about 20p more if you have the NVQ 2 in care but I haven't started this because we are expected to pay back the fees if we leave within two years of completion and I don't know if I want to tie myself to the company or lifestyle for two years. Plus I have A levels in Health and Social Care so would rather not end up paying for a level 2 qualification when I already have a level 3.

Had my interview, it wasn't really an interview, just filled in an application form and answered questions. Fortunately, I was able to state the hours I am available, so I won't have to work late evenings or nights and the pay is £7.00 during the week and £7.50 on weekends- quite reasonable for someone under 21.

I was interested in applying, do you know the minimum age to work as a care worker there?

Graduating from university in Jan 2014, I was interested in getting a career within nursing, thanks to the fact that postgraduate is the only pathway to break into the world of Psychology (I would never advise choosing Psychology as a degree, but that's for a different post). Whilst at uni I tried to look for care worker jobs but was only when I returned from university that I saw a post looking for drivers and non drivers for Sevacare where previously every care agency only required drivers, and being a non driver getting a position within their companies proved very difficult. I applied and was contacted immediately, within a few days for an interview and was successful. A week later I enrolled on the 3 day induction course which were typical 9-5 classroom based sessions where you have to pass a few exams such as Medication Level 3 in order to administer medication in the field. Once the induction was complete and some paperwork had been filled out, I began in the field roughly 2 weeks later shadowing an experienced carer for 5 days where I was shown the personal care aspect of the role and reiterate how to manage hoists etc. Now what I will say is the induction DOES NOT prepare you in the slightest for the actual work you will be carrying out! It is far too theory based and has no practical aspect that will serve you well in the field, if you shadow a good carer this is where you will learn the most. I am in my third week with the company and now doing cover shifts both doubles and singles calls. For anyone that says care work is easy, you have no idea what you are talking about. It is immensely tiring and very hard work. Expect long days (7:30am - 9:00pm with some breaks dispersed throughout the day), non stop calls from on call for cover shifts (which you have the legal right to refuse) and terrible pay. There have been some heavy cuts tot he healthcare system in this country in the most recent years and I think the wage for carers are steadily decreasing, I am on £6.50 an hour but if you take a lot of calls then you can expect to take about £1200 home every month. This job isn't for everyone and you will know whether it is or not as soon as you start shadowing, the personal care aspect i.e cleaning and changing pads isn't for the faint hearted at times! Being patient, open minded and friendly are the most important qualities to have. There is a lot of work involved but is hugely rewarding. I have plans of moving on to Healthcare Assistant roles in the coming years to increase hospital based experience before returning to university to get qualified in Mental Health Nursing. Another positive factor of working for this company is after 6 months of employment they will pay for you to work towards your NVQ Level 2 in Health and Social Care which is now being phased in as a legal requirement to work in the care industry in this country. Its a fantastic qualification to have behind you even if you have other prospects.

Overall, I am enjoying myself but I am only 3 weeks in and I have been exposed to the varying degrees of care required from various clients which is good because it can vary from 'very sound' meaning they are able to do pretty much everything for themselves besides medication all the way to the other end of the spectrum which means can involve them having advanced dementia, no speech and are bed bound. Expect anything and everything and you will be fine as a care worker, and even when it gets difficult and you do not get thanked for your work, always wear a smile because what you are doing is invaluable!

So I have an interview with Sevacare tomorrow for a Care Worker job. I'm interested in a career in Psychology so I'm interested in this role because it involves working with people. I expect I'll be going to different senior people's homes and helping them e.g. caring for them, shopping. Has anyone got any experience working for this company or any other care worker role? e.g. what is the salary like? do you enjoy it?