Right at Home in Marblehead Reporter

Right at Home's opening in Salem, MA was featured in the Marblehead Reporter. It was nice to see Jay quoted and talking about our Telephony system. Telephony is our electronic time carding system. When a Right at Home aide goes into a home, they dial into a specific 800 number. They put in their employee code and tell the system if they are punching in or out. This system even works if the phone is blocked because it uses E911 technology to read the telephone it is being dialed from. The call is only valid if it comes from the client's telephone.

The call then is automatically logged into our scheduling software. If a call does not go into our system within 15 minutes of the start of a shift, then there is an outcall to our supervisors. We can proactively call the client, aide or family to find out if everything is OK. This technology has given us the first proactive monitoring system that we could implement for all shifts, at all times. This increases our client's security immensely and it has been extremely well received by families.

Large Amounts of Money in the Home

I heard a terrible incident today regarding an elder (not a Right at Home client) that kept several thousand dollars of cash in their home. For whatever reason, the hiding place for this money became evident to the home care worker in the home. It is sad to report that the temptation became too much and the elder had their money go missing.

The reason that I share this is to warn potential families that keeping large sums of money in the home is not a good choice. Because the client above used a reliable agency, they are protected by insurance. There were criminal background checks done on the employee, however an incident still occurred.

Many elders and families hire individual through the Internet or through a referral. They do not have an agency's protection. Home health aides are usually in a personal, low income situation. They are just like any other group - the vast majority of them are honest, hard working people, but unfortunately a very small percentage make wrong choices.

The bottom line is.....whether it is home health, contractors, repair people....any service people...please don't keep large amounts of cash in your house. It is the safe choice.