Please note: This feature is available as part of the majority of Birdie’s packages, excluding any Care Management, Entry, and Care Management+Rostering packages. Please get in touch if interested in more information on this feature!
We know there's more to a weekly rota than visits alone. From care professional introductions to shadowing and supervisions, it's important to block and record all this time - and ensure these different interactions are paid correctly. That’s why the team at Birdie has made it so you can easily distinguish between different types of interactions above and beyond care delivery.
This will also make it easier for Care Professionals to prepare for each unique interaction type and easier for Finance Teams to evidence activities that may have different billing structures.
What are interaction types?
Interaction types relate to the type of interaction a care professional has with a care recipient visit. Within Birdie, you will now be able to distinguish between the following:
Shadowing - where another individual is shadowing a care delivery visit
Introductions - where a care professional is introduced to a care recipient
Supervisions - where another individual is supervising a care professional
How to use interaction types
To start, you will first need to schedule your visit or visit schedule. This can be done via the normal process. If you need a refresher on how to do this, please view the help centre article here.
You will then identify the specific visit you’d like to include a specific interaction type - i.e. you want to make a visit on Tuesday at 9 am to be an ‘Introduction’.
You will then click on that visit and select View visit details.
Click Care team. Here, you will see the care professional assigned to the visit. You will also now see the option to Allocate another type of carer.
Click on + Allocate another type of carer. This will pull up a pop-up, where you will be able to identify the care professional and the interaction type you want to add to this visit.
Use the drop-down menus to select the:
Care professional
Interaction type
Interaction type options include Supervision, Shadowing and Introduction.
Pay rate card
Select the pay rate you wish to allocate to this care professional for this specific interaction type and visit.
Charge rate card
Select the charge rate you wish to allocate to this care recipient for this specific interaction type and visit.
Please note: the pay and/or charge rate(s) you allocate for this interaction will apply for this specific individual and specific visit only - meaning it will not apply across the whole visit schedule. For example, if you have a Visit Schedule that happens Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday - but you only apply the interaction type for Shadowing for a specific visit that happens on Monday March 28th with Sabrina Treitz joining the introduction, it will only apply for that visit and interaction type.
Once happy, click Assign caregiver.
You will now see this Care Professional within the Care Team tab. This will also be clearly labelled with the interaction type, which is 'Introduction' in the below example.
You can always go back and click remove from visit if you’ve made a mistake or need to change this.
When you navigate back to the rota screen, this information will now be surfaced within the hovercard - as you hover over that specific visit.
Please note: Interaction type labels won't carry over into the Finance tab in this first iteration.
How to create interaction types which are not associated with a visit
If you conduct supervisions in the office or you need to create an interaction type that is not linked to a Care recipient or their visit schedule we suggest you follow the following approach for scheduling these non-care interactions.
First, create a 'dummy client', this is a fake care recipient that you will not get charged for, for a more in-depth guide on how to create a ‘dummy client’, please see this article.
Then you will assign your Care Professional to the dummy client as you normally would when assigning them to a visit. Once you have done this you can select +allocate another type of carer and continue to add the information as shown above.
You can adjust the pay rate as appropriate. For example, you can override their existing rate with a specific rate card for supervision or appraisals.
Assign the supervisor or manager to the same dummy client as an 'additional carer', with the same interaction type. If they are not paid an additional amount for this time the visit can be discarded from payroll.
What if I do not want to charge for an interaction type?
If you do not want to charge for an interaction type you can follow the below steps.
Start by creating an invoice rate with just the name but do not include any details. This will essentially act the same way as a 0-invoice rate card. You could also name this something like interaction rate.
After setting the above rate, the zero rate appears in the interaction invoice rate drop-down, select this and when the interaction visit is completed the charge rate will appear as N/A.
How will these interaction types appear within the Birdie app?
Birdie will clearly label the interaction type within the Birdie app.
Similar to double-up visits being indicated with an icon, there will now be an additional icon to indicate the interaction type, so Care Professionals know exactly what to expect.
The icon can be viewed below:
You can then tap onto the icon next to any visit assigned. You’ll then see a pop-up alerting you this visit is paired, including the name of the person or persons you are paired with. The type of interaction (i.e. shadow) will also be called out.
You will continue to a see who you are partnered with in the case of a double-up visit, where applicable.
An example can be seen below:
Birdie Academy video