Respite holidays: care included, or a carer of your own

The NHS lists respite holidays among the main kinds of respite care, alongside day centres, a short stay in a care home and a paid carer at home. What respite care is and the respite care guide explain the wider choices.

The first route is a break where care is part of what you book. A respite centre, or a hotel with its own care staff, takes your relative as a guest, and its staff can help with washing, dressing, the toilet, meals and medicines during the stay. Some also welcome the family member who usually does the caring, who can then have a holiday without being on duty.

The second route is a group holiday run by a travel company or charity that brings carers or volunteer helpers along. Your relative joins a planned trip, by coach, cruise or plane, and the organiser supplies the help on the way and at the destination.

The third route is to choose the holiday yourselves and bring a carer of your own. You pick the cottage, hotel or caravan, the dates and the pace of each day, and a self-employed carer comes too and helps in the way they would at home. Can you take a carer on holiday with you? covers this route in more detail.

There is a fourth arrangement worth knowing about, even though it is not a holiday for your relative. If the person who needs the break is you, and your relative would rather stay at home, a carer can cover at home while you go away. Holiday cover while you are away explains how that works.

The biggest difference is who gives the care. At a respite centre or on a group trip, the staff look after several guests, and you agree with them in advance how your relative likes to be helped. With a carer of your own, one person looks after your relative, and you can meet them before you go. For somebody living with dementia, or anybody who finds new faces hard, that continuity can matter more than the destination. Dementia-friendly holidays goes through what to look for if memory is the main concern.

The second difference is equipment and the number of hands. A centre built for disabled guests may have ceiling hoists, profiling beds and accessible bathrooms ready in the room, and enough staff for care that needs two people at once. Bringing your own carer means finding a place with the right bathroom and bed yourself, or hiring equipment near where you stay, and if your relative needs two people for every transfer, you would need two carers or a family member who can help. Holidays for disabled adults in the UK explains how to check that a place is as accessible as it says.

The third difference is freedom. A care-included break gives you the provider's location and dates, while your own carer can come wherever you choose to go. Where to take an older person on holiday in the UK has ideas for places that work well with limited mobility.

If a carer of your own sounds like the better fit, you can search for carers near you and compare their rates before you settle on dates. Each profile shows the carer's rate, their experience in their own words and their reviews, and you can message the ones who might suit before you commit to anything. If you would like carers to come to you, the form on the holiday carers guide lets you describe the trip and the help your relative needs.

Revitalise used to run accessible holiday centres with care on site. Its website says it closed its centres in 2024 because of the cost-of-living crisis, and it now gives grants towards breaks that disabled people and carers arrange for themselves. You may still find older guides and council directories that describe its centres, so check the date on anything you read.

The organisations below still offer breaks with care or help included. Prices, dates and what care they can manage are for each organisation to confirm.

• Calvert Kielder, in Kielder Water and Forest Park in Northumberland, runs respite breaks for adults. Its page says its care package includes 24-hour care in an en-suite room, all meals, snacks and drinks, and activities, and when we read it in October 2026 it gave a price from £1,500 for a 7-night stay. That is their figure, and the final price depends on the care your relative needs.
• Holidays with Help is a charity that runs respite care breaks for people with disabilities and their carers, with support from trained helpers. It says that it cannot provide 24-hour nursing care, so ask about nights before you book.
• Limitless Travel sells accessible coach holidays, cruises and holidays abroad, and says it brings qualified carers on every trip.
• The Disaway Trust is a charity that organises group holidays for physically disabled people, with volunteer helpers.
• Dementia Adventure is a charity that runs supported holidays for people living with dementia.

Tourism for All, a national charity for accessible tourism, can help you find accessible places to stay if you decide to bring your own carer instead.

Before you book a care-included break, ask the same questions you would ask a care home or a care agency at home. If the provider gives personal care, it should be registered with the Care Quality Commission in England, and you can look up its latest inspection report on the CQC website.

The first thing to decide is whether the carer works by the hour or lives in for the trip. Hourly suits a holiday where your relative manages much of the day and needs help at set times, such as getting up, a trip out in the afternoon and getting ready for bed. Live-in suits a holiday where help is needed on and off all day. A live-in carer stays with your relative for the trip, needs a room of their own and proper breaks, and is paid a weekly rate. Can I take a live-in carer on holiday with me? covers rest, sleep and the room on a longer trip.

The table shows what the carer's time comes to for a week away at three levels of help. It is the carer's time only. Your own holiday, and the carer's travel, room and meals, come on top.

Under the standard PrimeCarers contract the carer's normal rate applies wherever the work happens, so a visit by the sea costs the same as a visit at home, and weekends are charged at the normal rate. The contract does set two uplifts: a bank holiday is charged at 1.5 times the carer's normal rate and Christmas Day at 2 times, so check your dates if you are going away over Easter, a summer bank holiday or Christmas.

The carer's own costs need agreeing too. Their train fare or fuel, a room and their meals are agreed between you and the carer, in writing, before you book anything. Travel expenses and mileage are only charged if they have been agreed in advance in writing, and the usual mileage figure on PrimeCarers is 55p a mile. Can you take a carer on holiday with you? sets out the full list of what changes and what stays the same.

Once you have found a carer who might suit, meet them before the holiday if you can, even for a short paid visit or a video call, so your relative is not travelling with a stranger. Agree the hours on duty each day, the carer's breaks, and who is with your relative while they take them. If you would like help with the arrangement, the managed service is a paid option on PrimeCarers that includes help with messaging carers and scheduling.

The council is the place to start if you have not been in touch with them already. The NHS says that councils will only pay for respite care for people they have assessed as needing it, after a needs assessment and a carer's assessment. If the assessments show that the family carer needs a break, the council may fund respite, and that could take the form of care while you are away or help towards a break. Councils decide this for themselves and may means-test what they pay towards, so ask what they can offer and get the answer in writing. If your relative already receives direct payments, ask whether they can be used for care during a holiday.

Attendance Allowance is paid to people over State Pension age who need help with personal care or supervision because of an illness or disability, at £77 or £115 a week in 2026/27. It is not means-tested, and your relative can spend it as they choose, including on a carer or a break. If your relative does not claim it yet, Attendance Allowance: who qualifies and how to claim explains how. For the family carer, Carer's Allowance is paid for the caring you do rather than for a holiday, and holiday cover while you are away explains what to check about it before you take a break.

Several charities give grants towards a break. Revitalise gives respite grants to disabled people and carers aged 18 or over, for breaks they arrange in the UK or abroad. The 3H Foundation gives grants towards the accommodation for disabled people and their carers on a low income. Carers Trust lists organisations that help carers take a holiday, and its local carer centres may know of grants near you. Turn2us has a free search for grants you might be able to apply for. Each charity sets its own rules and amounts, so read their pages before applying.

If the cost of a holiday is out of reach this year, a shorter break can still help. Respite at home or in a care home compares the options nearer home, and how to fund respite covers the funding routes in more detail.