Trusted care, close to home

At the Local Authority of Mortsel, personalised care comes first. Home care services are organised into five multidisciplinary neighbourhood teams, where home care and domestic care professionals work closely together. Each team is supported by a scheduler, a working team coach and social workers who coordinate care around each client.

This local approach has one clear objective: ensuring clients are supported by familiar faces whenever possible.

“That benefits both our clients and our care professionals. Strong relationships develop over time, and employees feel more involved. Whenever possible, we arrange replacements within the same neighbourhood team,” says Paulien Gysels, Neighbourhood Care Coordinator at the Local Authority of Mortsel.

The challenge: moving beyond spreadsheets and paper

Effective scheduling is the foundation of that approach. As the organisation continued to grow, however, maintaining a clear overview became increasingly difficult.

For years, home care and domestic care schedules were managed through Excel spreadsheets, paper documents and email. Every change had to be updated manually and communicated again to both employees and clients.

Important client information and practical notes were also scattered across different sources. As a result, the organisation relied heavily on the knowledge and experience of individual schedulers and social workers.

“If someone unexpectedly called in sick, taking over the schedule became extremely difficult. Much of the information simply existed in the heads of our schedulers and social workers. That was far from ideal for ensuring continuity of care,” Paulien explains.

Every schedule change also generated additional communication.

“We used to distribute the schedule once a week. But every time something changed, everyone had to be informed again. We constantly received phone calls about addresses or client details. Today, the latest schedule is simply available in Planpoint. It really is that straightforward,” adds Chadani Van Put, Social Worker at the Local Authority of Mortsel.

To future-proof its operations, the organisation started looking for one central employee scheduling platform.

One central scheduling platform for every neighbourhood team

Today, all neighbourhood teams are scheduled through one central platform. Schedules are always up to date and accessible to schedulers, coaches and care professionals wherever they are.

Using the mobile app, employees can instantly see which clients they are visiting, which colleagues they are working with and all relevant practical information.

Schedule changes are immediately visible to everyone, making communication much simpler and ensuring everyone always works with the same up-to-date information.

Administrative staff, coaches and social workers can also access schedules and client information themselves, without relying on a scheduler.

Greater visibility for schedulers and care professionals

Since implementing Planpoint, the Local Authority of Mortsel has gained greater visibility, reduced administration and created a scheduling process that is easier to transfer between colleagues.

Schedulers save valuable time because schedule changes no longer need to be communicated manually. Care professionals always have access to the latest schedules and client information, while new employees find their way more quickly thanks to one central source of information.

The next step is already planned. Mortsel will also digitalise time registration and invoicing through Planpoint, eliminating another important administrative process.

One central scheduling platform – Home care and domestic care services are planned from one shared environment across five neighbourhood teams.

Always up-to-date information – Schedules and client information are instantly available to everyone involved.

Mobile access – Care professionals can view schedules, client information and updates through the mobile app.

Ready for the next step – Mortsel is preparing to digitalise time registration and invoicing with Planpoint.