What working in care actually looks like at Kintota

Search “care jobs Plymouth” and you’ll get pages of listings that all read roughly the same. Shifts, a rate of pay, a line about “making a difference.” What most of them don’t tell you is what the job actually gives back to you, week to week and year to year, for staying and getting good at it. So here’s ours, in full.

What do you get from day one?

Every new starter gets an onboarding kit before their first shift — including a personal SOS alarm, because your safety on a visit matters more than anything else we could hand you. There’s a premium travel mug in there too, which sounds small until you’re on your third home visit of the morning and genuinely grateful for it. Pass your probation, and there’s a “Night In” hamper waiting for you — proper snacks, plus a takeaway voucher, as a straightforward thank-you for making it through the part of any new job that’s hardest.

What changes once you’ve been here a year?

Once you’re an accredited practitioner — a year or more in, trained and confident in the role — you get a YMCA gym membership, on us. You also get a paid weekly “Study Power-Hour”: time set aside, and paid, specifically for you to work on your own training and development. Not squeezed in around a shift. A proper hour, every week, that’s yours.

What about further down the line?

Senior specialists get a monthly mobile car valet — because if you’re driving between clients across Plymouth all week, your car deserves some looking after too — along with meal-kit credits and three extra “Recharge” days a year, on top of standard leave, specifically for your mental health.

Stay longer still, and reach clinical lead level, and it goes further again: a professional home cleaning service, and a two-week fully paid “Legacy” Sabbatical. Two weeks off, fully paid, as recognition for the kind of long service that’s genuinely rare in this sector.

What training do you actually get?

Proper training, funded, not a box-ticking exercise. Medication management, GDPR, safe food handling, Oliver McGowan training on autism and learning disability, Mental Health First Aid, safeguarding, and dementia training all come as standard. If you want to go further, we fund NVQ Level 3 and Level 5 for staff who want the qualification to match the work they’re already doing.

Does pay depend on your job title?

No. Every member of staff, from Director down to the newest support worker on the rota, is paid the same hourly rate. We don’t dress that up — it’s a straightforward equal pay policy, and it means the person doing your induction is paid on exactly the same basis as the person running the company. We think that’s how it should work in a team built on the idea that everyone’s contribution matters equally, because it does.

What else is there, day to day?

Free in-house counselling, for any member of staff who wants to talk something through, at any point. Private health insurance that covers your children too, not just you — up to two each. None of this is dressed up as a perk you have to hunt for in a handbook — it’s just part of what working here means.

Who do you actually speak to about it?

Real people, by name, from your very first enquiry. Ring the office and ask for Deborah or Lucy — Deborah handles first enquiries and client matters, and Lucy runs operations, including your induction, your DBS, your probation meeting at three months, and your annual review after that. You’re not filling in a form and waiting to hear from “the team.” You’re speaking to Deborah or Lucy, by name, from day one.

Why does any of this matter if you’re deciding where to work?

Because care work is genuinely hard, and any organisation that pretends otherwise isn’t being straight with you. Early starts, physically and emotionally demanding visits, real responsibility for someone else’s wellbeing — that’s the job, whoever you work for. What differs, hugely, is whether the organisation around you is built to support you through that, or just to roster you into it. We built ours around SOS alarms and Study Power-Hours and equal pay on purpose, because we ask a lot of the people who do this work, and we think what comes back the other way should match it.

What’s the next step?

If you’re weighing up care jobs in Plymouth and want to know exactly what joining Kintota looks like — from your first enquiry through to your first shift, and everything after — our staff journey sets it all out, step by step, with the names of the people you’ll actually meet along the way.

Give us a call, ask for Deborah or Lucy, and find out what working in care could look like, done properly.