Christies Care Ltd - Care Assistant FAQs

About Christies Care

We were established in 1987 and have been owned by the present directors since 1991. We have grown to be among the largest specialist providers of Living-in Care in the UK.

We do living-in care only. We do nothing else. So, when you work with us, you are working with people who know the market and are known in the market as experts of living-in care.

We have grown to our present size, over 20,000 weeks of living-in care a year, by working to satisfy both our care assistants and our clients. Size isn't everything but it gives us the resources to manage our business effectively, which helps both clients and care assistants.

Our growth and success gives us the confidence to say, "We give lots of work to all good care assistants who come to us and complete our training course."

We have our head office and training school in Saxmundham, Suffolk, about 100 miles North East of London. From there we arrange care all over the country.

What is Living-in Care

As people grow older and frailer they often need help, to allow them to continue to live at home: so they do not have to go into a care home. At first, it may be no more than a couple of visits of 30 minutes each day, to make a meal, help dress or undress, tidy up a bit. Gradually, more help is needed. Then, someone is needed at night and we are thinking of a full-time care assistant, living-in and helping their client at home. This is where Christies Care plays its part, being one of the largest living-in care agencies in the UK.

The living-in care assistant carries out all the tasks needed to allow the client the independence to stay at home, seven days and nights a week. What are these tasks? Of course, it depends on what your client wants and needs. Housekeeping, shopping, companionship: all of these and then as much personal care as your client needs.

With Christies Care it is not only older people. We have over 150 younger clients. For example, we have clients with MS who have lived with their condition for many years, but finally have to agree that they need full-time help.

Caring for a seriously disabled person means doing everything for them and allowing them to live in their own home with as much independence and dignity as possible.Or a person is born with learning difficulties or cerebral palsy and is looked after by parents for over 20 years, they want a home of their own. Or a person has a diving accident, crashes a car and breaks their spine or has a brain injury. With several hundred clients, all over the UK and ranging in age from 20 to over 100, we can provide the right work for a wide variety of care assistants.

We accept all sensible people to be care assistants for us, even if they have had little practical "caring" experience. Our four-day training course, plus the hands on supervised experience we offer, will give you all the help you need, if you are willing to learn, be flexible and patient with your client .

Key Facts about being a Living-in Care Assistant

You are given intensive training and have the opportunity to do up to four days of additional practical experience in a client's house before you start work. We support you.

Accomodation and, in most cases, all your travel costs are paid whilst you are at work. So you have no living expenses - save a lot of money!

You are well paid. You will generally earn between £375.00 and £500.00 per week. The average is over £400.00. We give you our guarantee of earnings which can be as high as £7900.00 (depending on the weeks you commit to us). Conditions apply to this guarantee.

You can decide which weeks you work and the weeks you want to take as holiday.

It is rewarding work, helping another person maintain dignity and independence in their own home.

You will see England better than any tourist - getting to know the country and people well!

Who is a successful Care Assistant

Caring is not very difficult to do. Your success depends almost entirely on your attitude to the work you do and your flexibility to deal with what may be a continually changing situation. However there are a few vital things to know:

• You must be legally allowed to work in the UK
• You must be serious about the work. We offer you a lot of training and commitment and we want a commitment from you in return. We want you to give us at least 10 weeks of work - we hope you give us more!
• You must be a reasonable cook, usually plain English food.
• You must be perfectly happy to do the housework and be a good housekeeper, and this refers to both men and women.
• Your English must be good enough to be understood at all times
• It is very useful to be able to drive, especially manual cars
• It is very useful to have had direct experience of looking after a disabled person, BUT your attitude is more important: are you happy to receive the training that we give you about personal care and help your client? If not I doubt caring is for you.
• Ladies are more in demand than men so, in general, a man has to be a bit "better" and willing to do a bit more.
• A man who cannot drive is harder to find work for than a woman who cannot drive
• If you are unfit, or not as young as you were, we may not be able to find you all the work that you want.
• You are not permitted to drink whilst working with a client.

What we offer you compared to others

We offer a unique combination of financial commitment, size, flexibility and training. No other agency does as much as us to help its care assistants.

We believe that many people want to fix up their working lives before going to the UK. That is why we have our recruitment offices in Australia, New Zealand, South Africa and Poland, to help you do this. They will make sure you have got all the details straight, BEFORE you get on the plane, so you can go from aeroplane to training to work with the minimum of fuss.

We know that it is often a serious financial commitment, coming to the UK for caring work. That is why we offer all care assistants a guarantee of earnings and free standby accommodation. You can commit to 12 weeks with us (guarantee £2750.00) or to 29 weeks (guarantee £7900.00). And we give you free accommodation if we let you down, (conditions apply). No other agency will give you twin guarantees like this. You will earn good money whilst working for Christies Care.

We want to train you well and get to know you while you train. That is why we give you four days of training, here in the office. You will meet us in the office and see how we work and our commitment to helping you get the work you want.

We also offer all care assistants the choice of up to four days of extra training before starting work. This is with a client at the client's house, so it's "real". And you are under the supervision and guidance of the experienced resident care assistant. So, you get your responsibility gradually. We hope you take advantage of this especially if you are new to caring. It will give you more confidence and make you a better care assistant in the shortest time.

What we ask of you in return

By the time you have arranged your trip, interview and training dates with us, we have made a big commitment to you.

What do we ask in return?
We ask for a small down payment of A$125.00 as evidence of your commitment to us. This is not an administration fee, but an advance payment of benefits you will get from Christies Care. You will pay this to our agent before she sends all your documentation through to the UK.

We accept it as evidence of your commitment to us and list below the benefits you will get for this commitment .

• A guarantee of earnings and accommodation
• A Christies Care garment
• An A-Z of London and maps of the UK
• Our letter forwarding service
• A sectional folder for all your papers
• Four days of free training with midday meal provided free .

What happens next

Fill in our online application form or contact our representative in Australia (Ruth Payne) and discuss it with her.

Ruth will then have an initial discussion with you, a short telephone interview to give us both confidence that it will work.

At this stage you can ask for a telephone call from the recruitment department in the UK. They make lots of these calls, to answer questions in detail and give you the up to date picture of the caring market.

Once all your references and other paperwork has reached our recruitment department in the UK ( via Ruth Payne if applicable), they will be in touch again to arrange your trip to Saxmundham, your training and the start of your career as a Christies Care Assistant.

What does our Australian Office do to help

Ruth Payne is our eyes and ears in Australia. She places advertisements, action queries and try and help everyone understand what it is like to work for Christies Care.

• She checks your application.
• She checks your references, visa etc.
• They help with sorting out accommodation in the UK.
• She answers any problems you have.
• She is local to you and looks after your interests.
• She is a vital part of the Christies Care objective - to find the right people in Australia to come to the UK and be successful living-in care assistants.

Christies Care Australia

Caring as a Career

Many people fall on hard times, maybe later in life. Divorce, illness, death of a partner, job loss, business failure: there are many reasons.  There you are, in your 40s, 50s or 60s, short of money and not feeling like looking for a full-time job.

Christies Care offers you a career in caring. You decide your pattern of work. Australia is a long way from the UK, so you may decide to have two big holidays at home, say March to May and then spring-time, in October and November, renting your house out over the summer.

We find you clients in the UK. You work hard and earn money with no living expenses, enough to go home and enjoy yourself, or help your pension. And so it goes on.  You can change your pattern of work, however, we do recommend that you return within six months each time, so there is no problem about renewing your references or re-training (we have strict rules about this and we follow them).

Will you return to the same clients? Sometimes. You must recognise that your old clients will have new carers while you are away and the personal link may be lost. But it often happens that the career carer can very nearly slip back into her old routine.  We have career carers who are in their late 60s now, having been with us for over ten years. And a few over 70! They do not deal with physically disabled clients like they used to. But, a good carer always has a choice of suitable clients.

Most of our career carers from Australia use their weeks off to go exploring the UK, or they visit the big cities of Europe.

Couples

We welcome applications from couples.

In our experience a carer will feel a lot less isolated, knowing that a partner is not too far away.

Can they work together ?  This is rare.  We have clients who need two carers, but almost always two carers of the same gender.

Our successful couples plan their work together, aiming to have the same weeks at work and the same weeks 'off'.  If a couple works for two weeks, they will have over £1,500 (gross) to spend on a week off.