Here we summarize 2023 and reflect on what is in the pipeline and what changes may come in personal assistance in 2024.
Highlights from 2023 that affected us in personal assistance
Strengthened right
On January 1, 2023, the law in LSS was amended to strengthen the right to assistance. According to all forecasts, the development would turn upwards in Sweden, the number of people entitled to assistance was expected to increase during the summer. Like many other assistance companies, we at Carelli prepared for an increased number of new customers. It turned out that there was no increase, not anywhere in Sweden, but the statistics unfortunately showed that the number of people entitled to assistance decreased month by month instead of increasing, this applied to both children and adults. This was in contrast to the government's proposal, which stated that the new reform would mean that the number of people entitled to assistance would increase by around 2000.
It is too early to say anything about the long-term effects of the law change and ISF (Inspektionen för socialförsäkringen) will make an evaluation during the year to be presented in January 2025. A first statement has been issued where they describe an increased number of applications and that more people were granted assistance compensation at the beginning of the year and that it then decreased. They go on to comment on several aspects of the legislative change, click on the link to read more on the ISF.
Authorization
In 2023, a major assistance company was questioned by IVO, which withdrew their license to provide assistance, among other things, because Ivo assessed that Humana and its representatives no longer meet the requirement for suitability in LSS and the Social Services Act. After a trial in court, the Administrative Court issued a judgment in which they considered that the company has failed in certain cases, including in its transparency in organized assistance. The Administrative Court considers that the shortcomings identified are relatively few and not sufficiently serious to justify the company and its representatives being considered unsuitable. The court considers that the company has taken reasonable measures to comply with IVO's supervisory decision and ensure quality in the business. As a result, the company's license to provide assistance was revoked.
This process did not directly affect our business but was a major issue in the industry. Some of our customers and assistants were concerned about their assistance and jobs. We were able to reassure them that we have a high level of quality and that there is regular quality assurance of our operations through, among other things, our municipal procurements.
Working Time Act and stricter rules on daily rest
Daily rest, based on the EU directives, has been a hot topic in the media during the end of 2023. One of the issues is the tightening of the rules on daily and weekly rest for workers. Despite the fact that few employees, employers or labor rights organizations believe that the stricter directives only bring something positive, but rather many believe that they make it more difficult for employees and employers, the directives are something that has started to apply and that many employers and employees have had to adapt to. The Working Hours Act regulates how much you can work per day, per week and per year. The law covers on-call time and standby time, breaks and rest periods, and night rest. The Working Hours Act applies to almost all work performed in Sweden. The Swedish Work Environment Authority describes that the Working Time Act is partly based on mandatory EU rules (2003/88/EC on certain aspects of the organization of working time). It allows parties to conclude collective agreements on working time, but it contains certain minimum rules on weekly rest, daily rest and total weekly working time. Read more on the Swedish Work Environment Authority website.
What happened in 2023 is that a national decision was taken to tighten and clarify the organization of working time in Sweden, such as for example for daily and weekly rest and are not any new provisions taken at EU level. Here you can read more about daily rest and exceptional cases in Sweden.
Sweden's municipalities and regions were the first to adapt to the new, stricter rules, which came into force for them on October 1, 2023. Our agreement, as a private assistance provider, is not yet ready, but our employer and industry organization, Vårdföretagarna, is in the middle of negotiations with municipalities on what the regulations will look like for us. What is clear is that the rules will apply from August 1, 2024, but we do not yet know what the agreement will mean for us, our customers and employees. For more information, you can check out the care providers.
Ownership of personal assistance services
That the lead agency for personal assistance has been discussed for many years, but it has been difficult to find consensus and agreement on the changes needed.
The current situation is that on March 1, 2023, Lars Lööw handed over the investigation into the principal authority to the Minister for Social Services, Camilla Waltersson Grönvall, in which the proposal is to gather all personal assistance with the state. Comments on the report were submitted in June, and in August the Government Offices announced that the report and the comments were being analyzed. Now we are all waiting for the government to present a bill so that nationalization can begin in 2026.
What about assistance payments?
The assistance allowance will be increased by 2.5% in 2024. In recent years, the assistance allowance has been increased by 1.5%, which has not covered the annual cost increases For 2024, the increase is therefore higher than in previous years, but it is still too low in relation to costs.
Many persons entitled to assistance, together with us assistance providers, describe the situation as difficult. The low compensation makes it difficult to achieve well-functioning personal assistance with good quality.
Assistance allowance is a financial compensation granted to the person entitled to assistance in order to be able to purchase personal assistance, either by providing it themselves, hiring the municipality or hiring an assistance company. This allowance should cover all the costs of the assistance, which we claim, it is far from doing today. For 2024, the reimbursement amounts to 332.60 SEK per hour. An example of how the compensation has not increased in relation to the costs is the salary increases for the assistants, which are expected to continue to be higher compared to the increase in compensation. As an assistance coordinator, there are incredibly tight margins to make our clients' assistance allowance sufficient. We claim that there are few companies that can currently offer their services for 332.60 SEK/h. As an assistance provider, we want to be able to offer our customers, those entitled to assistance, a qualitative and good assistance while also offering our assistants good wages and conditions. We at Carelli Assistans are so happy that the issue of assistance compensation being in line with the increased costs is so topical and that work is underway to get our politicians to take this issue seriously and give us better conditions to provide our assistance. This means that we, like all assistance companies, are entering 2024 with great challenges to get the compensation to cover the costs while not wanting to jeopardize the quality and the service we are so proud of.
On track for 2024
As we mentioned before, there are several challenges that we know await personal assistance during the year and this will place greater demands on us as assistance providers. However, we do not feel worried because we go in prepared, with proper planning, good knowledge of the world, solid competence and with good cooperation with others in the industry. With this in mind, we feel confident that, just as in previous years, we will be able to run a business with good quality and with safe conditions for both our customers and our assistants.
Many of the 2,000 people the government expected to receive personal assistance thanks to the change in the law on January 1, 2023 are still waiting. Only a small proportion of these are so far entitled to assistance and we can only hope that more of these 2000 will receive positive decisions in 2024.
At Carelli Assistans, we are organized so that we have the opportunity to quickly adapt and receive new customers around Sweden and it is precisely this that we look forward to most during the year. Getting to know our new customers and together shaping the assistance that they need and want.
We are also anxious to know whether we will receive any information about the main responsibility for personal assistance. We hope that the bill contains improvements for people who need and are entitled to personal assistance.
Incidentally, we do not believe that the year 2024 will offer any new major surprises for personal assistance, but of course we will have to wait and see.