Social care employee referral app Care Friends is celebrating its first anniversary having paid out over £500,000 to care workers via its points reward system.
The app was launched last June in partnership with Skills for Care, the strategic body for workforce development for adult social care in England, offering a new recruitment solution for social care employers.
The app works as a digital employee referral system allowing existing employees to recommend friends and connections for jobs in social care.
For every recommendation made where the suggested candidate expresses interest in a role, users earn points.
Points can then be cashed-in with every point equating to £1 in value. Over 260,000 job shares have been generated by 20,000 care workers using the app in the past year.
Care Friends can also be used to support retention as well as recruitment. Employers can reward their staff with bonus points on the app at any time which can be used to recognise achievements and thank employees for good work.
The app has sourced over 16,000 candidates in the past year, and many are new recruits to the growing care sector.
When it launched the app had 40 pilot clients, but a year on it have more than 450 employers on board and has expanded to Ireland and Australia as well as the UK.
"It has never been more challenging to recruit in adult social care, so I am really pleased to see how the app has gathered momentum with both care workers and their employers in the 12 months since we launched,” said Care Friends chief executive and founder Neil Eastwood.
“The personal connections of our 1.5m-strong workforce represent the last remaining untapped pool of new recruits big enough to help fill around 100,000 vacancies the sector has on any given day, and support the growth in demand for care,” he added.
