Employ 24-hour carer privately

Many families want to keep relatives in need of care in their own homes for as long as possible, but this is not possible without support.

Register a 24-hour caregiver

A so-called 24-hour care worker can also be employed privately. As soon as you, as a private employer, have found help, you need to draw up an employment contract and register the employee. quitt takes care of the entire registration, administration and communication with the authorities for you and creates a sample employment contract at the end of the registration process. We have summarized the data required for registering the employment relationship via quitt in a separate article.

What needs to be considered in a 24-hour care contract

There are several general conditions that need to be taken into account, particularly in the case of a contract for care staff who live with you. The focus is on the workload and hourly wage. This is because the actual working hours can often not be precisely measured in this model and on-call time is considered working time. We have compiled a checklist of key points for you:

• Workload: If you cannot quantify the working hours exactly, we recommend you to hire full-time and thus also compensate the on-call time. However, this should be discussed bilaterally with the elderly care
• Board and lodging are not included in the minimum wage, so the actual hourly wage must be higher than the German minimum wage
• 24-hour caregivers usually live in a household with the person being cared for: at least one lockable room of their own must be provided
• 24-hour caregivers are usually not allowed to carry out any medical activities
• Care workers from abroad, e.g. from Poland or Lithuania, often work alternately, in the so-called tandem model. The interim periods can be covered by unpaid leave, but the private employee must take out their own health insurance during the time off. The quitt sample employment contract can be enhanced independently with unpaid leave. We have summarized other important information for foreign nursing staff here.

Our support team will be happy to provide you with detailed care advice.

What does the private employment of 24-hour care cost?

The costs essentially depend on the gross wage agreed by the employer. For example, hiring a 24-hour caregiver for 40 hours per week at the current minimum wage and free accommodation results in a gross wage of just under €2,150. The employer costs including the quitt fee then amount to just under € 2,800 per month for a mutually fair and appreciative employment relationship. Agencies that employ nursing staff themselves or place self-employed people must expect to pay at least €3,000 per month. Especially as the salary and cost structure is usually very intransparent, i.e. the costs are slightly higher than private employment, but the caregiver receives a significantly lower salary. 

The entire employer costs of care can be deducted at 20%, up to a maximum of €4,000 per year. Plus you also receive the usual care allowance depending on the level of care.