Social care direct payments

Managing your social care direct payments

It's important that you manage direct payment properly so that you can get the care and support that you need.

By law, we must monitor your financial records if you have direct payment.

How to manage your direct payment

When you receive direct payment from us you'll need to keep:

  • a copy of your support plan (your practitioner will give you this)
  • bills, receipts or any other documents to show how you have spent your direct payment.

We'll regularly contact you to check your records. You must be prepared to share any bills and receipts with us if we ask.

If you receive your direct payment through the Medway prepaid card, we'll be able to view the bank statements online. You should still keep these statements for your own records.

We suggest that you keep monthly records to make it easier for you to keep track of your income and spending.

You'll need to keep all supporting documents relating to the direct payment and your support for at least 6 financial years from the date of the payment, even if the payments have stopped.

If you employ your own staff

If you employ your own staff, even if they're only temporary, you'll also need:

  • a list of their names and addresses
  • a signed HM Revenue and Customs P45 or P46 for each of your staff
  • a payroll organisation to process your personal assistants' (PAs) wages and act on your behalf with HMRC and pension providers
  • employment contracts for each person
  • insurance documents
  • time sheets that your PAs or carers must fill in and sign.

If you choose to employ your own staff, you'll be supported by your Self-Directed Support Coordinator throughout this process. 

If you receive support through an employment agency

If you do not employ the person to provide your support, you must ensure that the person or organisation providing the support accepts and knows that they're not employed by you.

They'll also need to have:

  • relevant and sufficient insurance
  • skills and qualifications
  • DBS checks
  • work permits. 

You must regularly check that this is up to date and varied in accordance with changes to the support provided.

An individual might also be registered as self-employed. This means you're required to check their employment status for tax purposes (CEST check). If the result of the PA's CEST check is undetermined, we will not support them on self-employed terms, however we'll support you with registering them as employed.

In some cases an individual may need to be regarded as employed. If you're not sure whether the work they're doing means that they're employed, the Self-Directed Support Team can help with this.

If you need to pay a financial contribution

If you need to make a financial contribution or want to top up your direct payments account, you can do this by setting up an ongoing payment with your bank. You'll need to do this from when your direct payment starts.

Your contribution must be paid onto your Medway prepaid card. It must not be paid directly to a PA or provider.

To set up a standing order you'll need to provide your bank with:

  • your name (as shown on your prepaid card)
  • the sort code (the 6 digit number)
  • the account number (the 8 digit number).

You'll also need to a provide a payment reference, which should include:

  • your bank account number the payment is being made from
  • either CC for client contributions or TP for top-ups.

For example, if your bank account number is 12345678 and you are setting up a payment for your client contribution, enter 12345678CC as your reference. If this was a top up payment, this would be 12345678TP.

Please set up client contribution and top up payments separately.

How we'll monitor your spending

Our Direct Payment Audit Team will use your transaction statements to carry out regular audits. These audits will:

  • check that you're paying your assessed financial contribution
  • ensure you're using the direct payment as set out in the care and support plan
  • check if there is any money building up in the account.

If you have more than 4 weeks balance on the account you'll need to tell us why. It could be that you have not used the direct payment due to being in hospital. If this is the case, we may ask for this money back. It could also be that money is reserved for invoices you have not yet paid or cheques that have not yet cleared.

However, it may also mean that your care and support plan needs to be reviewed. Your practitioner will look at this with you.

Support with managing your direct payments

The Self-Directed Support Team can:

  • give information on keeping direct payment records
  • help you with recruiting PAs
  • share information about the responsibilities of being an employer.

Find out more about how we can support you with your direct payments.