Houston Caregivers, In-Home Care Services You Can Trust
Encore Caregivers provides Houston and the surrounding areas with in-home care services you can trust. Our experienced caregivers are ready to help with whatever you or your loved one may need, from meal preparation to medication reminders. We strive to provide compassionate and quality home health care services enabling seniors and those with disabilities to remain safe, independent, and happy in their homes.
Benefits of Encore In Home Care Services
Because In-home care services provide the elderly a much-desired and confident way to age in place, its benefits are many. Benefits include:
- Helping the client stay in their own home, so often their preference
- Giving the client any assistance needed with companionship, light-housekeeping and activities of daily living
- Offering personalized care, unique to the client’s needs
- Helping the client maintain a familiar and comfortable quality of life
- Helping the client to stay in surroundings filled with memories and precious possessions
- Offering continued safety and well-being at home, often preventing hospital admissions/readmissions
- Preventing the elderly or disabled from being relocated to a hospital, facility or other unfamiliar location
- Sustaining/increasing the client’s level of independence and autonomy
- Offering more one-on-one interaction with a caregiver than would likely be possible with staff in a facility setting
- Offering transportation services
- Offering medication reminders
- Offering a comfortable and familiar environment for family visits
- Offering a workable home situation for a beloved pet
- Offering peace of mind knowing that a loved one is under safe, professional care
- Reducing stress associated with caregiving by family members
- Enabling family members to be family, not personal care aides
- Enabling family members to spend more quality time with their loved ones
- Allowing privacy and separation from large, community environments
- Offering meaningful connections with caregivers – providing needed social interaction that can assist in slowing cognitive decline
Encore Caregivers’ experienced, professional caregivers assist Houston-area families every day.
Encore Caregivers, since 2009
How Do I Find A Caregiver?
And, now, I have to put in a plug for independent agencies. I wouldn’t hire anything but an independent for my loved one. Why? Franchised agencies are required to work in a limited geographic area. That means that they can only recruit caregivers in and around that limited area and serve clients in that same restricted area. Time after time, Encore Caregivers gets calls from future clients who say that their caregiver didn’t come on Tuesday and the agency had to send someone else. Then they got a call saying that the caregiver for Friday can’t come and the agency has no one else to send. That tells us right off that the agency is small and most likely new or a franchise with so many limits on their service. Encore Caregivers works throughout the Houston Metro area (no restrictions) allowing us to keep the best and one of the largest pools of quality caregivers available.
One of the greatest benefits of hiring a local in-home caregiver through Encore Caregivers is that we are very well aware that the RELATIONSHIP IS ALMOST EVERYTHING! The Houston Metro Area is filled with relationships that we have put into motion, thanks to our expert caregivers and more than a bit of help from our nurse. When she leaves a new client’s home, she brings back to the care coordinators information regarding the client besides the client’s physical condition. Gregarious? Introspective? We have outgoing clients all over town and we match them with outgoing caregivers. We have the quiet-type of clients and match them with a caregiver of the same ilk. It is comforting, it is such a smooth process when we get it just right and we have been getting it right for more than 13 years and 2,000,000 million hours of service. But, Encore Caregivers also knows that the in-home caregivers must be trained up to the level of care needed and they must be in fair proximity to the case, for consistency-sake.
Talk about a winning formula:
SKILL LEVEL
PROXIMITY TO THE CASE
PERSONALITY
- COMPANIONSHIP
- LIGHT HOUSEKEEPING
- ASSISTANCE WITH ACTIVITIES OF DAILY LIVING
So You’re Ready To Begin Care?
transcribed from a new client call
She will come out and complete a 45-minute assessment, required by the state and free of charge. She will bring a pocket folder filled with about 35 pages of everything that the State of Texas wants you to know about wills, directives, rights of the elderly, our drug testing policy, our holidays, how to get out of Houston in the next hurricane, etc. She will leave that for your reading pleasure (smile) and then ask you to sign or initial about eight pages in the front pocket.
I want to make clear that Encore Caregivers has no contract, pre-pay or down payment. We see those as red flags in our industry. You tell us when to start and you tell us when to stop. Here is how we bill: Our office manager, on Tuesdays, looks back at the previous week and bills for service that we have already provided. We have always rolled that way and always will. It is professional and it demonstrates our commitment to you. The pages you will be initialing or signing are data only: Emergency Family Contacts, Primary Care Physician, Specialists, Acknowledgement of Service Cost and Payment Options, Can We Transport You in Your Car or in Our Car?, etc. Data only.
The next to last thing that Cindy Devlin RN, our nurse, will do is to pull out a sheet and say, ‘Okay, let’s tick through a list of everything that Encore Caregivers can do for you.’
Once the Care Plan is complete, Cindy will verify with you your chosen hours of service. She will then come back to the office and work with our care coordinators to choose the right caregivers for you. She will base those decisions on three criteria: Do they have the skill level for the case? Cindy is so very careful to make sure the answer is yes. Do they live in a fair proximity to the case? We work throughout the Houston Metro Area. You do not want a caregiver from far Katy working for you in the Champions area or vice versa. You want caregivers fairly close by for consistency. Do their personalities mesh with the client’s household? We have gregarious clients and match them with outgoing caregivers. We have quiet, introspective clients and match them with caregivers of the same ilk.
The next call you get will be from an Encore Caregivers’ care coordinator letting you know that, for example, ‘Our caregiver, Silvia Anderson will be at your house Tuesday at 8 a.m. to start care.’ ”
Are You Getting a Good Deal in In-Home Care?
If there is any possibility of working any kind of deal at all, we all enjoy paying the least possible for what we buy. But, here is an important point: Buying the least expensive can be very smart, but not if it is cheap. Cheap has the connotation of shoddy or of little value. No one should do cheap. It never, ever pays off in the long-run. It is the same with senior in-home care.
When a potential client calls to talk about senior in-home care for their loved one, often they say that they are just shopping around. We like the fact that they care enough to invest their time in doing the research that it takes to make an informed decision. The part that concerns us is that they may think that the least expensive option is the way to go.
Private Caregiver – often, but not always, a private caregiver is a less expensive option – the friendly lady from church, the kind neighbor, or the caregiver you found listed on that new app. They are so agreeable. Surely this will work out fine, you think.
Oh, wait a minute. What if the caregiver gets sick? What happens when the caregiver goes on vacation? Has a flat tire? Has to take care of her own business? Needs to see to her own family’s needs? Wants the day off? What if the caregiver suddenly tells you that she wants to come in at 10 a.m. instead of 7 a.m. from now on and that she doesn’t want to work weekends anymore and that she needs to leave at 1 p.m. this Friday?
How’s it going, boss? Do you have a back-up?
Saying “boss” is more than just a snarkie comment. We mean “boss” in the most legal-of-terms. It is important to know that a caregiver does not meet the state or federal standard for “independent contractor” like a typical plumber or exterminating service would, for example. You are the private caregiver’s boss. By hiring this private caregiver, you are legally committing to be “the employer” and:
- Pay all federal and state payroll taxes (Medicare, FICA, and unemployment taxes – at least 10% of wages)
- Secure worker’s compensation insurance (10% of wages)
- Deposit payroll deductions
- File quarterly and annual state and federal payroll tax reports
- Comply with federal immigration hiring laws as well as a host of other employment laws
- Recruit, hire and fire employees
- Schedule employees and then reschedule employees when the first are late, sick or need time off
Is It Worth It?
You can try the private caregiver track, if you would like. But, here are some terms with which you might have to become familiar – and quickly: unemployment claim, federal payroll tax audit, accrued employee payroll taxes, accrued employer payroll taxes, penalties, interest, medical expenses, allowance for pain and suffering and legal fees. We see it and hear about it all too often from clients who are just fed-up and finally opt for professional care offered by a licensed agency – with much relief, we might add.
A Great Value!
Encore Caregivers is a licensed Personal Assistance Service, and all of our caregivers are our employees. We are responsible for all expenses and costs associated with state and federal employment laws, work related injuries and all other employer obligations. The burden is on our shoulders, not yours. No worries. When you compare us with other licensed in-home care agencies, we are not the cheapest, we are not the most expensive. We always offer great value. What you get for our fee is the best service there is!
What are we so proud of?
- Even though the state says that we do not need to have a nurse on staff, because we are a non-medical service -- we have an RN on staff who answers questions from clients, families and caregivers every day. That elevates the standard of our care.
- Our RN also offers unequaled training to our caregivers. That elevates the standard of our care.
- The state Department of Health and Human Services, the entity that licenses us, says that we must offer two in-service trainings annually to our caregivers. We offer three. That elevates the standard of our care.
- Our nurse also offers Skills Lab trainings every month to keep our caregivers polished and their skills well-honed. That elevates the standard of our care.
- We can’t forget our 24-hour line. Although most services say that they “can be reached around the clock”, unlike theirs, our main number is manned by a trained, professional care-coordinator – 24 hours per day, 365 days per year. There is never an answering service or worse yet, a voice-mail message. Your call will always be answered by someone who knows the assignment, knows the caregiver and who can offer professional help quickly. That elevates the standard of our care.
- We handle all scheduling and communicate any necessary changes immediately. The depth and breadth of our caregiver pool results in an amazing flexibility with staffing. We aren’t perfect, but we rarely, ever disappoint. That elevates the standard of our care.
Buyer Beware!
What could they possibly say to make us sound the alarm? How about this: We were attending a “senior expo” at the United Way in March of 2018. A lady, from a competing in-home care agency (that shall remain nameless) stopped us. “Aren’t you with Encore Caregivers,” she asked. When we said yes, she went on: “Don’t you have to work really, really hard to hire caregivers?” We answered with a smile and an … “always!” She then told us that her agency had “figured it out.”
Unless the bus driver is a professional caregiver with the required experience, Encore Caregivers would turn them away with a polite but quick “Thank you for applying,” and would move on to the next candidate. How about these figures? From June – December of 2022, 503 caregivers told us that they would like employment with Encore Caregivers. We hired less than 30% of those applicants.
Why do we hire less than 30% of applicants?
Encore Caregivers is dedicated to being very, very, very
Painstaking
Opinionated
Particular
Meticulous
as to who represents us and takes care of our clients!
Half way through lunch, the wife said, “You know, it is so very expensive to hire a caregiver.” We agreed. She went on, “It’s gotten to where we can only afford to do 411s for our biggest clients.” My eyes met my husband’s. We shared a “YIKES!” moment. 411s are criminal background checks. CRIMINAL … BACKGROUND … CHECKS …!?! Would Encore Caregivers ever, ever, ever put a caregiver with no local/state/national criminal background check into a home to take care of a loved one? The answer is a hard “No! never ever!” Buyer beware!
Why Do Families Choose an In-Home Care Provider?
Encore Caregivers is in total agreement with the results of a recent survey by Home Care Pulse, a leading industry research firm.
SURVEY SAID: the top four reasons consumers choose an in-home care provider are:
Company Reputation
Recommendations of family and friends
Recommendations of a referral source
Consumer marketing
Also, when you see an ad or peruse our Website, rest assured that you are looking at quality information that will help you make the best decision for in-home care for your loved one. At Encore Caregivers, our reputation and the referrals that stem from it, let us know that the quality service we tout on our Web Site and in our ads, is the quality service that we deliver.
Encore Caregivers, since 2009
Questions To Ask an In-Home Care Agency
At Encore Caregivers, we truly appreciate a family that cares enough about their loved one to ask detailed questions when they call us. We are more than happy to answer and spend quite a lot of time educating and informing (average call for a client needing care @41 minutes). What questions might quickly weed out the pretenders and identify a solid source of professional care for your loved one?
Are you licensed?
How long have you been in business?
Do you have a nurse on staff?
Do you have a minimum hours requirement?
What are your fees? Is there a down payment? A contract?
Please be very careful and attentive when asking about the money side of the equation. A fee schedule should be offered up front. Your questions should not be dismissed with a, “Let us determine first exactly what level of care your loved one needs and then we can discuss price.” That is often used as a stalling tactic. Fees should be presented up front.
Down payments and contracts are seen by Encore Caregivers as red flags in the in-home care industry. At Encore Caregivers, there is no contract. You tell us when to start and you tell us when to stop. We have no downpayment. We have never rolled that way and never will. We bill weekly.
Since our caregivers are working hard to fill their days, and their most desired shift is eight hours or more, we have to charge on a sliding scale. We must pay the caregivers more to accept a shorter shift. For an eight hour shift or longer, we charge $25 per hour. For a 4-7 hour shift, we charge $26.50 per hour. The price goes up as the shift hours go down. If there are complex care issues like couple care or total care, the cost will be a bit higher. Ask us. We will tell you exactly. Simple.
What options do we have for billing?
Encore Caregivers accepts private pay or Long Term Care Insurance as payment. At Encore Caregivers, our Manager of Office Administration bills every Tuesday for service we have already provided the previous week. We also offer billing options for our clients.
- We can also e-mail a link and the family can click the link and pay on-line.
- We can keep a credit card on file and it will be billed weekly, with an additional 2.7% processing fee.
- We can bill by a weekly, mailed invoice and clients pay us by check. Check-writing is increasingly rare, but we do continue to allow it as a service to our clients.
- We can bill by a weekly, mailed invoice and clients pay us by check. Check-writing is increasingly rare, but we do continue to allow it as a service to our clients.
How many caregivers do you employ?
A small staff opens the door for disappointment. Too often we get calls from a senior working with another in-home care service. “They called me to tell me that my regular caregiver couldn’t come on Tuesday. They sent a late replacement. Now they are telling me that my caregiver canceled for tomorrow and they don’t have anyone else to send.”
That scenario is all too frequent and indicates to us that either the in-home care company with which they are dealing is new and very small, or is a small franchise with a limited geographic service area into which the franchisee must recruit caregivers. It is difficult.
At Encore Caregivers, we recruit every business day and have a large staff of select caregivers. Currently we have 125 caregivers on staff. Our staff levels are a real number and represent real, professional caregivers who have earned a place on our staff and are currently working. That number fluctuates weekly as family needs require.
Who do you hire as caregivers?
Encore Caregivers hires only skilled, trained, professional caregivers. They are CNAs (Certified Nurse Assistants), HHAs (Home Health Aids), PCAs (Patient Care Assistants), etc.
They have a minimum of one year, hands-on, direct client care experience in the last two years, with an institution or home health service – under the supervision of a nurse.
The nice lady who lets us know that she has a heart for caregiving, the recent retiree who wants to fill a few hours each week, the college student looking for part-time employment – all of these well-meaning folks we thank profusely for thinking of us and we move on to other, qualified candidates. Encore Caregivers hires only experienced, professional caregivers.
What can I expect the caregiver to do?
The Texas Department of Health and Human Services sets the structure for what an in-home caregiver can do. The three main categories of assistance are companionship, light housekeeping and help with ADLs (activities of daily living).
At Encore Caregivers, we send our professional caregivers out to clients’ residences: homes, hospitals, independent and assisted living facilities, skilled nursing units, rehabilitation hospitals, hotels, apartments, etc, wherever our clients need us. They help clients in each of these three categories.
Companionship: Reading, reminiscing, going on walks, just going – period – as appropriate to the client’s condition.. Pre-COVID, we’d hear, “Let’s go to the Hill Country and look at the flowers.” We did that. We went to wedding rehearsals and family reunions and theaters, restaurants and museums. COVID has kicked us in the knee a bit. Now, our caregivers mostly transport clients to doctors’ appointments, pharmacies, grocery stores, etc, but the field is expanding. We can drive the client in their car or in our car. If the caregiver’s car is used, the client is charged an additional $.70 per mile. Our caregivers are helping clients with hobbies that they can’t do alone anymore, or they don’t want to do alone anymore. This is the crucial social interaction sorely lacking in so many seniors’ lives.
Light Housekeeping: The State of Texas allows caregivers to do 20% of their work as light housekeeping. Basically, we keep clean, sanitary and organized the areas where the client predominantly lives: bedroom, bathroom, kitchen, living room. Can we change bed linens? Do laundry? Clean the bathroom? Vacuum? Dust? Make light meals and snacks? Yes, we are doing that throughout the Houston Metro Area every day. Examples of what we won’t do: pick up grandchildren’s toys, clean a guest room, rake leaves, shine shoes, clean windows, pressure wash the garage. We focus on client care.
Assistance with ADLs (Activities of Daily Living): This is a massive category, one that includes functions that most of us take for granted – walking, eating, drinking, showering, bathing, grooming, dressing, toileting and more. Encore Caregivers’ experienced, professional caregivers have been assisting loved-ones in the Houston area with ADLs since 2009.
Are your caregivers your employees?
- Pays all federal and state payroll taxes (Medicare, FICA, and unemployment taxes – at least 10% of wages)
- Secures worker’s compensation insurance (10% of wages)
- Deposits payroll deductions
- Files quarterly and annual state and federal payroll tax reports
- Complies with federal immigration hiring laws as well as a host of other employment laws
Encore Caregivers is licensed, bonded and insured. No worries
What is your annual training requirement for caregivers?
Through monthly skills labs, three-times-a-year in-service training and directed on-line training our caregivers stay on top of the best practices in client care.
Our nurse requires at least 12 hours of annual training for veteran caregivers. Newly hired caregivers must complete 4, 1-hour on-line courses and are matched with our field lead in an 8-week mentoring program before they are considered “seasoned Encore Caregivers professionals”
Don’t Stress
Some personalities charge straight ahead – plowing through facts, working desperately to insert their will, blood pressure up, teeth ground together, nary a smile. Impatience is the order of the day. Bystanders beware!
Others accept the reality, work with it, make adaptations to lifestyle, find some semblance of joy. Bystanders enjoy and benefit!
The cost of the former can be great. Interrupted sleep. Deteriorating health. Ruined relationships – business and personal. The blessings of the latter can be enjoyed by all. The resulting, calming effect can inspire others and make such an uncomfortable, aggravating, protracted valley in our lives seem more bearable.
Here’s to your health and continuing good fortune – live long and prosper.
Note: Encore Caregivers relieves stress and offers peace of mind to families throughout the Houston Metro Area. It is a great bi-product of the heart-felt, professional work we do. If you need us, we will be there for you.
Caregivers Help Older Adults Stay Home
Often older adults prefer to remain at home rather than be relocated to a hospital or facility. Continued safety and well-being at home can be provided by professional caregivers. Professional caregivers offer a form of non-medical, personal care support that enables individuals to continue to live safely in familiar surroundings and ensures an increased level of independence and autonomy for their clients.
The primary ways in which a caregiver can assist the elderly are as follows:
Companionship
Light Housekeeping
Assistance with ADLs (Activities of Daily Living):
Families find many benefits in in-home care. In-home care services can give family members peace of mind knowing that their loved one is under safe, professional care. This helps to reduce the stress associated with caregiving, enables family members to be family not personal care aides, and spend more quality time with their loved ones.
In-home care can be a much more comfortable alternative to life in a healthcare facility, and its appeal is growing as families increasingly become aware of in-home care as a viable (and so often preferable) option.
Encore Caregivers’ experienced, professional caregivers assist Houston-area families every day.
Find A Rewarding Career with Encore Caregivers
An in-home caregiver is someone who goes into a residence (home, hotel, hospital, assisted living, skilled nursing, rehab facility, etc.) to provide care for someone who cannot care for themselves. Whether the person is a senior, or other adult needing assistance, Encore Caregivers’ staff of trained professionals is working around the clock, throughout the Houston Metro Area, providing companionship, light housekeeping and help with what the state of Texas calls ADLs (activities of daily living).
And it’s so rewarding. Our caregivers are providing a safe and comfortable environment for our clients, enabling them to maintain as much independence as possible. The client’s quality of life is improved and often the client and caregiver form meaningful connections which make the work so very significant and fulfilling.
Why is working with Encore Caregivers preferred over working anywhere else?
- Competitive pay
- Flexible scheduling
- Bonuses
- Spotlight Award
- Excellent Communication with Staff
- Great Training: on-line, with an RN in monthly, hands-on skills labs, or at any of the total of 12 sessions of in-service training offered annually
AND EVEN MORE, WE PROMISE:
- With an RN in the office, she will be there for you
- With our professional care coordinators, they will be there for you
- With our 24-hour on-call professionals, they will be there for you
- With our amazing office staff, we will be there for you
- We are family-owned and operated and make so much of what we do -- FUN
- We take care of our employees like no other agency – try us!
What are we looking for? Only the best caregivers, of course!
An Encore Caregiver will need to meet our minimum requirements (listed below), but more than that, you will need:
- A genuine interest in helping people
- A strong work ethic
- Solid problem-solving abilities
- Patience
- Compassion
- Empathy
- Strong communication skills
- Strong organizational skills
- Dependability
- Resilience to Manage Stress
Our minimum requirements for employment are
- Verifiable one year of full-time experience (SUPERVISED BY A NURSE) within the last two years in direct client care in an institutional setting, e.g. hospital or nursing facility, or one year full-time experience (SUPERVISED BY A NURSE) within the last two years in a home health agency
- Phone and fax contacts for all previous employers
- Valid Texas Driver’s License
- Social Security card and/or U.S. passport, and if not a U.S. citizen, INS authorization to work in the U.S.
- Your own car – no one can take you to work
- Proof of current auto insurance
- Current negative results from TB test – skin test taken less than 12 months prior, chest x-ray taken less than five years prior
- COVID-19 vaccination
- Weekend availability – Each week at least a Saturday or Sunday
Awards and Accolades
