Hello Caregivers, I have found an amazing website called elderhelpers. I found a volunteer through this website. She comes over once a week for 4 to 5 hours. She cleans, cooks, reads to my parents, and is just an all around super gal. She told me the other day that she would be happy to come more often. Now, I know you're probably thinking that you would not be able to trust someone like this. Well...the company says that they do background checks and I talked to her over the phone first, then I interviewed her in person in a public place, & I was there the first couple time she was with my parents. She has now been with us for a few months and we adore her. There are some people out there that just want to volunteer & help older people and she is one of them. I've already called another gal on the website who is a nursing student who wants to volunteer with the elderly. She said she would grocery shop or do anything that I needed. This is free folks! Except for the fee. I think it is about $300 a year, but again well worth it. Hope this helps someone out there! Of course you have to be smart about it, but if you hit on a good volunteer it is wonderful!!
Seems like this would be a good idea..in theory... but is risky that you could end up paying 300,00 and never get anything out of it.. and possibly waste a lot of time.
300 seems kind of steep to take that chance. I can look up the volunteers in my area but have no way of knowing if the ones that I would choose would even be available or are still interested.
Sounds like the volunteers are also encouraged to make a donation..so getting money from both the volunteers and the people needing volunteers.
I'm also not too satisfied about how well the volunteers are checked out. I just don't see a level of detail that I would want to see to get involved in this.. Like.. what kind of background check do they do ? Who pays for the background check? Soo.. not enough warm and fuzzy for me.... too bad...
eldershelpers/Helpers/faqs-rates/
There's one in Michigan so I can check it out with the Michigan Department of Labor & Economic Growth which provides information on corporations in Michigan (if it is in fact incorporated or created as a legal entity). I'd like to see who's behind this group.
I do plan to do some more searching; it sounds too good to be true. I'm especially interested in their recruitment, screening and funding.
Its great that the volunteers actually want to help! I'm not used to that I guess :). Does the company do background checks for each volunteer.. or do you have to perform your own checks? Have you had any issues with volunteers?
Correct me, ladies and gents, if I'm wrong.