Domiciliary care rota software for UK home care teams
Home care rostering and staff scheduling in one place. Keep the same carers with the same clients, get every change to the right phone, and keep the clocked hours your minimum wage checks rely on.
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Recurring patterns for continuity of care
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Open shifts and changes pushed to carers’ phones
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Mobile clock-in with location recorded
What makes a home care rota hard
A team spread across a town, working alone, with every client expecting a familiar face.
Travel time between visits is paid time
For minimum wage purposes, a carer driving from one client to the next is working. A run of back-to-back 30-minute calls with no gap between them looks efficient on paper and is the classic route to an underpayment.
Continuity is what clients notice
People receiving care at home want to see the same faces. Every time a regular carer is swapped out at the last minute, a client meets a stranger at their front door.
Your team never comes into the office
Carers start from home and work alone all day. The rota, every change to it and every request for cover has to reach a phone, not a noticeboard.
Split days stretch working time
A morning run and an evening run with a long gap in between can still breach the 11 hours’ rest rule when the next morning starts early. Nobody spots it until the 17-week average is already over.
Home care rota software for a team on the move
Regular patterns, kept regular
Recurring shifts and rota templates keep the same carer on the same pattern week after week, so continuity is the default rather than an effort.
The rota on every carer’s phone
Shifts, changes and open shifts arrive as push notifications. Staff set their own availability and claim open shifts in the app.
Clock in and out on the phone
Carers clock in and out from their own smartphone, with the GPS location recorded at each clock-in and clock-out, and optional photo proof.
DBS and training tracked by role
Set the certifications each role requires, including DBS checks and driving licences, and see expiry dates before they lapse.
Working time warnings
Warnings for short rest between shifts and staff approaching their maximum hours, raised while you build the rota.
Approved hours to Xero
Clocked hours become timesheets for approval, with the wage cost in pounds, then go to Xero Payroll UK without retyping.
For home care, live-in and supported living
Home care agencies
Morning, lunch, tea and bed runs covered by a part-time team who mostly never meet in the office.
Live-in care
Longer placements with handovers between carers, where rest and holiday have to be planned weeks ahead.
Supported living
Staff teams attached to a service, with shifts, sleep-ins and cover that work more like a small home.
Night and waking-night services
Overnight cover where the night worker limit and the 11 hours’ rest rule decide who can work tomorrow.
Reablement and short-term care
Packages that start at short notice, so availability has to be known before the referral arrives.
Franchise and multi-branch providers
Each branch runs its own rota, with a single view of hours and costs across them.
The rules a domiciliary care rota has to meet
Home care providers answer to the CQC for who they send, and to employment law for how those people are paid and rested. Both depend on an accurate record of who worked when.
Minimum wage and travel time
£12.71 an hour for workers aged 21 and over from 1 April 2026. Travel between visits counts as working time, so pay for the period has to cover it. A rota that allows no time between calls does not make that travel disappear; it just leaves it unpaid.
Check your effective rateCQC registration, Regulation 18 and Schedule 3
Personal care given where people live is a regulated activity, so providers in England register under the Health and Social Care Act 2008. Regulation 18 requires enough suitably qualified, competent, skilled and experienced staff, and Schedule 3 sets the recruitment records you must hold, including criminal record certificates.
Track DBS checks and certificationsWorking Time Regulations 1998
A 48-hour weekly average over 17 weeks (with a written opt-out), a 20-minute break over six hours, 11 hours’ rest between working days and 24 hours off each week. Split days and late bed runs followed by early starts are where home care breaks the 11-hour rule.
Read the rota laws guideRight to work checks
Check every carer’s right to work before they start. Where permission is time-limited, as it is for sponsored workers, check the documents again before it expires — and keep a record that you did.
Read the right to work guideEmployment Rights Act 2025
Statutory sick pay from day one since 6 April 2026. Expected in 2027 and still subject to consultation: a right to be offered guaranteed hours, reasonable notice of shifts, and payment where a shift is cancelled or cut short at short notice — all of which land hardest on zero-hours home care contracts.
What changes and whenCalculate your rota savings
See how much coordinator time and money your agency could save with RosterElf rota software.
Your current rostering
Based on 70% time reduction with automated rostering
Your potential savings
No credit card required
Free templates and tools for home care
Excel downloads and calculators with no signup, built on UK working time and pay rules.
Staff availability template
Collect when each carer can work before you build the rota.
OpenZero-hours rota template
Keeps shifts offered, accepted and worked apart.
OpenMinimum wage checker
Test total pay against total hours, including travel between visits.
OpenHoliday entitlement calculator
Pro-rata 5.6 weeks, plus 12.07% accrual for irregular-hours staff.
OpenReviews from our customers
Read what our clients have to say about us
Andrew Nathan
November 13, 2025
"We are extremely happy with Roster Elf, it's a great improvement on the previous system we were using. Sean and all the staff have been fantastic, really know their stuff and make using RosterElf a pleasure."
Monica Van De Laak
October 16, 2025
"Sean was an amazing help, very patient and thorough."
Mary C.
October 13, 2025
"I can see my roster, enter availability, put leave in advance and clock on and off easily."
Why home care providers choose RosterElf
Comparing options? Our UK rota software buying guide sets out what to look for.
Built for shift-based teams who work away from a base
Every rota change reaches the carer’s phone, not a noticeboard
Clock-in records with location, kept with each timesheet
Rota, training records, absence and hours in one place
Wage cost in pounds while you build, not after payroll runs
Free plan for small agencies, with no card required to start
Real support from people who understand your business
Our team knows UK rota and working time rules, and can walk you through setting up your agency. No call centre, no ticket queue.
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Help with roles, rota setup and working time settings
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Import your team and go live in a day
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Real people, not a chatbot
Home care rota questions
Travel time, registration, recruitment checks and holiday for UK domiciliary care.
- For National Minimum Wage purposes, yes. GOV.UK guidance treats travelling from one assignment to another as working time, and gives the example of a care worker driving from one client to another between appointments. Travel from home to the first visit is generally not working time. Total pay for the period, divided by all working hours including travel between visits, must not fall below the minimum wage. See our minimum wage guide.
- No. RosterElf is rota, time and HR software: it plans who works when, records when carers clock in and out, tracks their certifications and sends approved hours to payroll. It does not plan driving routes, monitor individual calls or hold care plans.
- 5.6 weeks a year, pro rata for part-time staff. Carers on irregular hours accrue at 12.07% of hours worked for leave years starting on or after 1 April 2024, and rolled-up holiday pay is lawful for them. Statutory sick pay has been payable from the first day of absence since 6 April 2026. See our holiday entitlement guide and statutory sick pay guide.