Fair Pricing Tool

Project Objectives and Scope

Building on the success of a pilot exercise using a Fair Pricing Tool for residential placements developed initially by Gloucestershire County Council, this project supports the roll out to other local authorities in the South West and expansion of the tool to address Supported Living placements. The Fair Pricing Tool allows care managers and social workers to identify an indicative cost of a care package that takes account of the level of support required, given the service user’s specific needs.

The aims of the project are:

• To consolidate the use of the Residential Care Fair Pricing Tool and Residential Care Provider and Placement Database and ensure correct usage and data recording
• To create a new Pricing Tool and to create new database pages for placements and providers, on the same principles as the Residential Care model, to be used for supported living placements. These regional developments have now been directed to support the introduction of a national toolkit to address supported living arrangements.
• To implement roll out of the Supported Living Fair Pricing Tool and both the current and expanded versions of the database to authorities, including training and support (events and guidance documents) for participating authorities
• To engage with providers where appropriate during the design and roll-out of the new tool and database

Anticipated gains from the project:

Cashable savings from controlled costs: Based on the findings from an initial pilot project, an average of 5% price reduction in residential costs was gained across 88 placements by using the Fair Pricing Tool

SWALD estimated that on the residential care side alone there could be efficiency gains of £546,000 in 2006-7, followed by £2.73million in 2007-8 and £5.5 million in 2008-2009. (This assumes that 5% savings apply to a maximum of 60% of all South West learning disability placements by the end of 2008-9.)

Wider implications and anticipated gains if it were successfully rolled out:

This is a project that is jointly supported by Local Authorities in the South West who already have a common interest in its outcomes and benefits. The project is likely to be of wider interest and has already attracted attention nationally from the Department of Health Valuing People Team and the Care Services Improvement Partnership.