The short answer
- Ring the council today, and use the word urgentUnder the Care Act a council may meet needs that appear to it to be urgent before it has carried out any assessment. Outside office hours, ask for the emergency duty team.
- Tell the ward that their patient cares for somebody at homeSay who that person is, where they live and what the patient normally does for them. A carer who can no longer care is a recognised reason for the NHS to respond at home.
- The routes to cover move at different speedsFamily, an urgent community response team and a carer booked directly can start within a day or two. A council package or a short stay in a care home takes longer.
- An hour every morning is about £140 a weekCarers on PrimeCarers charge £18 to £25 an hour with our fee included. Nights start at £130, and a live-in carer from £1,050 a week.
Figures are what families pay on PrimeCarers, with our fee included. Agencies charge £28 to £35 an hour for the same visit. Benefit and savings figures are for England in 2026/27.
What to do today
The four calls to make today, in this order
The first thing to settle is whether your relative is safe tonight. The second is to tell the people who can put cover in place that nobody is doing the caring. None of these calls costs anything.
- 1
Find out how your relative is right now
Within the hourRing them, or somebody who can get to the house, and check the plain things: have they eaten, have they taken their tablets, can they get to the bathroom and back safely. If they seem unwell, ring 111. If they are at immediate risk, ring 999. - 2
Tell the ward that their patient cares for somebody at home
TodayGive the name and address of the person they care for and say what the caring involves, including nights. Ward staff can pass it to the hospital social work team and the local authority, and it should be recorded before anybody talks about discharge. - 3
Ring adult social care and say the need is urgent
TodayRing the council for the area where your relative lives, which may not be the council where you live. The council finder on gov.uk gives you the right number, and out of hours you can ask for the emergency duty team. - 4
Ask about an urgent community response team
TodayAsk NHS 111 or your relative’s GP surgery whether an urgent community response team covers the area. These teams visit people at home, and an unpaid carer who can no longer care is one of the situations they are there for.
Write down who you spoke to and what they said they would do. You will be telling the same story to several people this week. If you are waiting on a call back, what to do while you wait covers the small arrangements that hold a house together for a day or two.
The routes to cover
The five routes to cover, and how quickly each one moves
The difference between these routes is mostly speed. The rail below shows when cover can realistically start on each one, what it costs and what to watch for. Families often use two at once: somebody to hold this evening, and something steadier next week.
Family, friends and neighbours
No charge
Cover can usually start today.
People who already know your relative and the house. Ask for named days rather than general offers of help, and write down who is doing which one.
This is the only route that can start within the hour, and it is the hardest one to hold for more than a few days once people go back to work.
An NHS urgent community response team
Free
Cover can usually start today, within two hours where a team covers the area.
Ask NHS 111, or your relative’s GP surgery, whether one covers the area. Say that the person who does the caring has gone into hospital.
A short health-led visit rather than a care package. It buys you a few days while something longer is arranged.
The council’s adult social care team
Free to ask
Cover can usually start today to about three days.
Ring the council for the area your relative lives in and say the needs are urgent. Outside office hours, ask for the emergency duty team.
A council can meet urgent needs before any assessment. What it arranges may be charged for afterwards, once it has looked at your relative’s savings and income.
A carer you book directly
£18 to £25 an hour
Cover can usually start today to a few days.
Search by postcode, read the profiles and reviews, and speak to two or three before you decide. You agree the days and the rate with the carer.
Nights start at £130 and a live-in carer starts at £1,050 a week. There is more choice for a start in three days than for a start tonight.
A short stay in a care home
Set by the home
Cover can usually start usually a week or more.
Ask the council’s adult social care team what is available near your relative, and ask the home about their own admission process.
It moves your relative out of their own house at a point when everything else has already changed, so it suits a long admission more than a short one.
The two fastest routes are the ones you arrange yourself. Family and neighbours can cover tonight but rarely a fortnight, and a carer booked directly can often start within a day or two. Which kind of cover you need depends on when your relative struggles: hourly care for the hard parts of the day, overnight care if the nights are the problem, and hiring a live-in carer temporarily if somebody needs to be there until the family carer is home. You can search carers by postcode and message several at once.
What the council can do
What you can ask the council for, and what it has to do
Councils are used to this call. The law does not make you wait for an assessment before anything can happen, so the words you use on the phone change how fast it moves.
Meeting urgent needs before any assessment
Care Act 2014, section 19(3)
A needs assessment for your relative
Free, whatever their savings
A carer’s assessment for the person in hospital
Free, and separate
A safeguarding enquiry if nobody acts
Care Act 2014, section 42
Ask for all of it in the same call. Local authority funding explains how an assessment turns into a care plan and money, and what is a carer’s assessment covers the one that belongs to the family carer.
What cover costs
What a week or a fortnight of paid cover costs
Cover while the family carer is in hospital is bought like any other care at home: by the hour, by the night or by the week. These are the figures for booking a carer directly on PrimeCarers.
£18–£25
An hour for visits
About £20 an hour is typical. Agencies charge £28 to £35 for the same visit.
£280
A fortnight of an hour every morning
Fourteen one-hour visits at £20 an hour. Two visits a day doubles it.
£130+
A night for a carer sleeping in the house
A waking night, where the carer is up and working, is £150 to £160.
£1,050+
A week for a live-in carer
A typical week is £1,120, and agencies typically charge from £1,400.
PrimeCarers rates, September 2026, our fee included. The carer sets their own rate, so nothing here is a quote.
Four things in the contract between a client and a carer matter when you are booking for a short spell. Notice is 48 hours for hourly care, and 7 days for live-in care once the carer has worked 168 hours, which is 48 hours before that. A visit the client cancels is payable in full, other than for unplanned hospitalisation, illness, or another reason the carer agrees to. Bank holidays are charged at one and a half times the carer's normal rate and Christmas Day at twice it. Travel costs are not charged unless you and the carer agree them in advance in writing. PrimeCarers charges nothing to cancel and does not set the terms between you and the carer. Our pricing covers what sits inside the hourly rate, and the hourly cost of care at home puts the private and agency figures side by side.
Handing over
What a carer needs to know before the first visit
A family carer holds a great deal in their head that has never been written down. If they are well enough to talk you through it, start there. If they are not, much of this can be read off the kitchen worktop.
Before the first visit
0 of 9 ticked
Medical
The day
Practical
Every carer on PrimeCarers has had an identity check, a right to work check and an enhanced DBS check on the Update Service, and has been interviewed online. They are insured while they work. Skills, training and references are for you to check with the carer. The care plan guide has a fuller template, and what a carer can do in an hour covers how much fits into a visit.
When they come home
What changes when the family carer comes out of hospital
The temptation is to stand everything down on the day they are discharged. Somebody who has been in hospital is usually weaker than they expect for a few weeks, and the caring they were doing is physical work.
- Before
Ask what they will not be able to do at first
Ask the ward about lifting, stairs, driving and how long the restrictions last. That answer decides how much cover to keep.
- Week 1
Keep the cover, and let it overlap
Keep the visits running for the first week home and ask the carer to come at the hardest part of the day. Two people in the house for a few days is how the handover back happens.
- Week 2
Reduce it on purpose rather than by default
Drop one visit at a time and see how the week goes, instead of stopping everything and starting again after a bad night. Notice on hourly care is 48 hours.
- Then
Write the plan you did not have this time
Write down the medicines, the routine, the numbers and who would cover. Ask the council for a carer’s assessment, and tell the GP surgery that this person is an unpaid carer.
There is a benefits point that catches people out. If the family carer claims Carer’s Allowance, DWP must be told if either of them will be in hospital, a nursing home or respite care for more than 12 weeks, or if the caring stops for more than 28 days for any other reason. A few days in hospital does not end a claim, and a long admission can. Carer’s Allowance explained covers the rules, and Carers UK has a guide to writing an emergency plan. If the family carer is coming home with care needs of their own, what to arrange when somebody is leaving hospital is written for that side of it.
Questions
Questions families ask when the carer is in hospital
Nobody takes over automatically, so the arrangement is usually made by the family. Ring the council for the area your mum lives in, say the need is urgent, and ask for the emergency duty team if the office is closed. Tell the hospital ward that their patient is an unpaid carer so it is passed on. Family, neighbours or a carer you book directly can cover the same evening.
Sometimes, yes. A carer booked directly can often start the same evening or the next morning, and there is more choice if you can wait a day. An NHS urgent community response team can visit within two hours where a team covers the area, although that is a short health-led visit rather than a care package. Visits on PrimeCarers cost £18 to £25 an hour with our fee included, and nobody charges more because you are in a hurry.
It may. A council can meet needs that appear to it to be urgent before any assessment, and it can charge for what it arranges once it has looked at your relative’s savings and income. In England for 2026/27, help with the cost starts below £23,250 of capital, and capital below £14,250 is ignored altogether. Local authority funding explains what happens next.
Not straight away. DWP must be told if the carer or the person they care for will be in hospital, a nursing home or respite care for more than 12 weeks, or if the caring stops for more than 28 days for any other reason. Report it once you know roughly how long the stay will be. Carer’s Allowance explained covers the benefit in full.
Start with the shortest practical visit, at the time of day they find hardest, and let it be one carer rather than a rota of faces. Introducing the carer on a video call first helps, and so does saying plainly that this is cover while the person who usually helps is unwell. If your relative has dementia, read dementia care before changing too much at once.
Notice is 48 hours for hourly care. For live-in care it is 7 days once the carer has worked 168 hours, and 48 hours before that. A visit the client cancels is payable in full, other than for unplanned hospitalisation, illness, or another reason the carer agrees to. PrimeCarers charges nothing to cancel and does not set the terms between you and the carer, so tell them your likely end date when you book.
Ring again the same day and ask for the duty social worker, then say that your relative has care needs, is at risk of being left without help, and cannot manage alone. A council has a duty to make enquiries where an adult with care needs is at risk of neglect and is unable to protect themselves. Ask for a reference number, and arrange cover yourself in the meantime.