Meaghan Burns planned ahead when she learned this month that her daughters’ day-care center would be closed for a week, and she arranged for her mom to baby-sit the girls.
Then, unexpectedly, Burns’ mother called with news that threatened to disrupt her workweek: “I have to go to Florida for a funeral, and I can’t help,” her mother said regretfully.
Burns, a human-resources coordinator at the University of Denver, remembered the university had recently contracted with Work Options Group, a Superior-based agency that provides backup care for just these types of situations.
For a subsidized rate of $4 an hour, Burns was able to hire a caregiver to watch her children so she could go to work.
“I did it, and it worked really well,” Burns said. “They were on time. The house was clean when I came home, and the kids were safe and they were fed.”
Work Options Group is contracted with 110 companies across the United States and Canada to provide backup care when employees encounter situations that could cause them to miss work – such as a sick nanny, a teenager home with the flu or an elderly parent whose regular caregiver is on vacation.
Work Options Group is among just a handful of agencies across the nation – such as Massachusetts-based Parents in a Pinch or New York- based Caregivers on Call – that offer backup care as an employee benefit. The firm has provided backup care for 13 years.
Employees of companies that offer the benefit simply call the agency when they know they’ll need a caregiver. Work Options Group arranges to have a licensed caregiver go to the home or, if parents prefer, for a day-care agency to keep the child, at a cost subsidized by employers.
“It’s about backing people up no matter what the situation,” said Cindy Carrillo, founder and chief executive of the agency.
Carrillo, who has a social-work background, said she believes the service allows employers to help employees overcome obstacles to their jobs.
The program shows a direct return on investment, Carrillo said.
“For every hour somebody is backed up, they can work. You reduced the absenteeism, the loss of the time and (the loss of) the person,” she said.
The service is offered only as an employee benefit, not to the general public. Under a standard plan that gives each employee 100 hours of backup care a year, employers pay $30 to $50 per employee, Carrillo said.
Employees pay $2 an hour per child for day care or $4 an hour for in-home care for up to three children.
Lee Claymore, president of the Denver affiliate of the National Human Resources Association, said he believes the benefit will become more popular.
“It’s very much a production loss if an employee’s mind is at home,” Claymore said. “(When employees are absent), the company has to reassign people to pick up the slack … and (that) person may not be as well-trained.”
Work Options Group has about 65 employees and a network with hundreds of licensed child-care centers and in-home agencies.
Dick Gartrell, director of human resources and Burns’ boss at DU, said the university enrolled in the program July 1 after the chancellor repeatedly heard stories about employees struggling with child-care issues.
He assembled a task force that recommended contracting with Work Options Group.
Gartrell said DU pays about $35 per employee for about 2,300 employees – ranging from maintenance staff to professors – to get 100 hours of backup care annually.
“It helps reduce absenteeism, which the managers are very pleased with,” Gartrell said.
Lisa D’Ambrosia, a partner and owner at the Denver law firm Minor & Brown, contracted with Work Options Group to help employees but also to stay competitive.
“As a small business in Colorado, we look for benefits that can be competitive. … It’s nice with recruiting,” said D’Am brosia, who has used the service for her three children and said it has saved her $10 to $11 an hour over standard rates.
Francie Sinton, a community liaison at First National Bank in Boulder, used Work Options Group last year when she realized she could no longer manage her job and the care of her 84-year-old mother, who was recovering from surgery.
“She was on a lot of medication and not real stable on her feet,” Sinton said.
Sinton and her husband took turns running home during lunch breaks to take care of her lunches or medications, but it was overwhelming.
Work Options Group provided caregivers who prepared breakfast and lunch for her mother and gave her medications.
“They would do some light housekeeping and the laundry and some little things around the kitchen,” Sinton said.
They also logged her mother’s daily activities, such as what she ate, her moods and the medications they gave her.
“It allowed me to go in and work the five hours a day that I work and know that she was going to be OK,” Sinton said.
Staff writer Karen Rouse can be reached at 303-954-1684 or krouse@denverpost.com.
About Work Options Group
- Provides backup care for all age groups through employers.
- Has 65 employees.
- Company revenue is expected to be $10 million this year, its 13th.
- Contracts with a network of more than 2,000 in- home care agencies and 3,000 licensed child-care centers.
- Clients include The Children’s Hospital in Denver, the University of Colorado, Prudential Financial, Merrill Lynch, the Mayo Clinic and Verizon Wireless.
