The week the new rates arrive
A framework publishes new rate schedules. Some trusts agree their own new rates. The care homes you supply want to talk about their charge rates, and your nurses expect their pay to reflect any change in NHS pay that their trust colleagues receive. Your finance lead has a list of rate tables to update, each in a spreadsheet or in the booking system's settings.
Some are updated on time. Some are late. Bookings already made for next month carry the old rates. Pay goes up before charge, or charge before pay. For weeks afterwards, invoices are rejected and nurses query their pay.
Why rate changes are error-prone
The mechanics are unforgiving. A new rate applies to shifts from a date, not to bookings made from a date. It has to be updated on both the pay and charge side. And there are many tables.
- Rate tables for each framework, client and grade are updated one by one.
- Bookings made before the change for shifts after it keep the old rate.
- Pay and charge tables are updated by different people at different times.
- There is no check that the new figures were typed correctly.
- Old tables are overwritten, so historic shifts cannot be priced correctly for queries.
Whether and how to change your nurses' pay, and what to agree with clients, are your commercial and employment decisions. The system should just apply what you decide, correctly, from the right date.
What errors cost
Invoice rejections after every rate change, with credit notes and reissues. Pay corrections for nurses, which erode trust. Margin that disappears for weeks because pay went up and charge did not. And an audit finding if framework rates were not applied from the right date.
Rate changes also land at a busy time. Many take effect in spring, when trusts are closing their financial year and staffing offices are checking agency invoices more carefully than usual, so errors are more likely to be caught and bounced.
| Rate change step | Manual risk | With dated rate tables |
|---|---|---|
| Entering new rates | Typos, missed tables | Entered once, compared side by side with old |
| Effective date | Applied to bookings made from the date | Applied to shifts worked from the date |
| Pay and charge | Updated separately | Updated together, with margin shown |
| Existing bookings | Left at old rates | Repriced automatically for shifts after the date |
| History | Overwritten | Old rates kept for past shifts |
How we build dated rate tables
- Every pay and charge rate table carries effective dates, so old and new rates live side by side.
- New rates can be entered or imported from a framework's schedule, and are shown next to the old rates, with the change and the margin effect for each grade and shift type.
- A second person approves the new table before it takes effect.
- Shifts are priced by the date they are worked, so existing bookings for shifts after the change are repriced automatically.
- Nurses and clients affected can be notified in the wording you choose.
- Past shifts keep the rates that applied at the time, for queries and audits.
The next rate change
New rates are entered once, checked against the old, approved, and applied from the right date to every booking, timesheet and invoice. Pay and charge move together. Margin effects are visible before the change goes live. And the weeks of rejected invoices and pay queries that used to follow each rate change do not happen.
Does this happen after your rate changes?
- Rate tables are updated one by one by hand.
- Bookings made before a rate change keep the old rate.
- Pay and charge changes happen at different times.
- Invoices are rejected in the weeks after a rate change.
- Old rates are lost when tables are updated.