My FIL was discharged from hospital back in October with 6 weeks free care - a covid package to get the bed free. The agency said we would have to start paying after 6 weeks if we wanted them to continue to which I verbally agreed as POA. However, despite my chasing them, we never received any written info on what the fees were, no care plan, no contract. The free care came to an end 14 nov but no invoice arrived for the rest of Nov. I chased them in December, gave my details for paperwork to be sent to but nothing.
Meanwhile I got conflicting information from the Council, one dept saying that paid funding would have to continue until a written financial assessment was done (it never was). But a social worker telephoned and said if he’s got more than 14K he just has to pay end of story. We were prepared to pay as he needed the care but wanted something in writing from the agency.
The care continued until the end of December when he was admitted to hospital after a fall. I called the agency saying we definitely wouldn’t be using their services any more and if we owed anything to invoice us immediately. I also raised serious concerns about the care being provided as I had installed a camera to check his wanderings and after the fall I went through it in detail and was shocked by the lack of care being provided.
I had a 2 hour meeting with a supervisor in which we went through the footage and she was shocked to. I also raised the matter of still not even knowing what we were paying for this really bad service and she was adamant that he was not self funding. I thought she was wrong about this but when 4 months passed with no invoices I figured she was correct. Then I got a voicemail out of the blue yesterday saying they were chasing overdue invoices and would post them to his address!!!
He then died in January so I never took the complaint any further as it was all too upsetting and lost the video footage due to not being a techy! So I am no longer his POA and although I was his executor we have just heard the will did not pass the probate stage - in which case it won’t be my problem anyway as we wont inherit under the rules of intestacy. But in case we do - just wondering where I stand and looking for intelligent words to use when dealing with them.