Flexible Time off, no overtime / low pay, unprofessional schedulers
Pros
- They are very flexible with time off as long as you ask off 2 weeks in advance. I have never been denied a day off when I've asked for it in advance even when my reasons for asking off were not always extraordinary. - They provided many training classes in which you are payed to take, and you can also take a CPR certification class for free. - To me the job was personally rewarding because you are able to help people who can't help themselves and you form a bond with the clients and their families. Reimbursed for mileage while on the job. - It seems that they do care for the clients and it shows through the types of workers that they hire to take care of the clients.
Cons
- The pay is low for the amount of work the caregivers do and this became more apparent once I learned how much they charge the clients. I understand that they have expenses but it is fairly obvious that they can afford to pay us more or at least pay us for overtime. Even though we are reimbursed for mileage on the job if you have multiple clients each day you have to drive a good amount to multiple locations without pay and this can take up a lot of time depending on how far each client lives. - The schedulers are very pushy and guilt you into filling shifts last minute. I met someone who used to work in one of the offices and they informed me that, in their office, they were trained to use the idea that most caregivers are kind people who might feel bad about not helping a client and will not refuse a fill in shift even if it is a large inconvenience for them to do so, I have even been called on days that I normally have off or that I have asked off. There are times where I have been scheduled or have had my shifts extended to where I had no time in breaks in between clients because of driving and had no time to eat all day. They allow you to bring food to clients' houses but there are some clients who do not permit this and others where you need to interact with the client the entire time you are at their house so you have no time to eat anyway. Many times I could not prepare meals because I was called in for a shift while at another shift, so had no time to go home or to pick something up. - In our office, we were not given the option of direct deposit for our pay checks. They say that they do this as a means to get to know their caregivers better, and while this may be true and I like the idea behind it, it is often an inconvenience to take time out of my already busy day to drive to the office to pick it up.
