How a caregiver is chosen before they reach your door

Every other question about home care is easier than this one. What it costs, which mornings, how long a visit runs — those are arrangements. Who is coming into the house is a matter of trust, and it is reasonable to want to know how that person was chosen.

The checks come first

Every caregiver is fully insured and bonded, completes a mandatory police background check and vulnerable sector screening, and has their references verified before they meet a client. Those standards apply to everyone, without exception, and they are completed before an introduction is made rather than alongside it.

Temperament, not only capability

Checks establish that someone is safe to send. They do not establish that someone is right for a particular household, and that is a different assessment.

The work asks for patience — the willingness to move at the pace the person sets rather than the pace that would finish the visit soonest. It asks for judgement about what to leave alone: routines that already work do not need improving. And it asks for discretion, because what a caregiver sees in a home stays in that home. None of those show up on a certificate.

Matched rather than assigned

Someone is going to be in the kitchen at eight in the morning, learning how a household runs. Whether that feels comfortable depends on the fit between two people, so the match is made deliberately rather than by whoever is free.

If the fit is not right

Sometimes a match does not work, and nobody has done anything wrong. Personalities do not always meet. Saying so early is far better than putting up with it, and it is a normal thing to raise rather than a complaint — tell us, and we will look at it again.

You can read more about who our caregivers are, or get in touch to talk about your own household.