AlayaCare vs. WellSky Personal Care

Working in rural NH, AlayaCare is essentially useless in my opinion. It's not a true app and requires communication with the web site in my opinion. Using the option of downloading data is hit or miss as to whether the data will actually sync back to the servers in my opinion. It also won't show you new visits unless you manually refresh the download I've found. I believe there are no option to send or display alerts if your schedule changes. To summarize: Unless you are always in areas with excellent service, AlayaCare is useless and you would be better off manually logging your times using pen and paper I believe. I am often in areas where AlayaCare won't work, yet I can still text, make calls, or visit websites I'v found

Incentivized

ClearCare/WellSky is not a software I would go out of my way to endorse. The coding bugs are numerous and fixing those bugs is not at all a priority. Unfortunately, it is still the most robust platform of it's kind - reporting, customization, integrations, automation capabilities, mobile app for caregivers - and with it becoming part of WellSky I am hopeful they will now have the resources to allocate for bug squishing

• Allows nurse to see their upcoming visits
• Set unavailable days/times so that visit aren't scheduled.
• Shows what services the patient needs

Incentivized

• Managing the scheduling process form the employee and client standpoint. In one screen we can see exactly what is going on with a client. Who's there, when they arrived, when they will be leaving, etc. Plus we can manage up to the minute changes in the care plan, in real time.
• Payment processing allows us to bill and initiate client payments with a few clicks. It automatically reconciles accounts receivable. It handles both credit card and ACH payments. Saves a bunch of time.
• Background checks are fast and easy because they are integrated into the platform. When a potential employee applies it starts the system begins all the steps in the hiring process. Once they get to orientation and have completed all of the other hiring process steps, with one click we initiate a customized background check that meets our licensing requirements.

Incentivized

• The IOS app appears to just be a front end for the web version which makes it ridiculously slow. Logging in, clocking in, or clocking out routinely takes 15+ seconds or longer if you don't have a strong cell connection. Doing a log in and then a clock in will take a full minute as communication with the server is so painfully slow.
• The app doesn't know if it's logged in or logged out until you try to do something like clock into a call I've found. The app will look like its clocking you in and 15 seconds later you get an error and are taken to the log in screen. This results in missed clocks, inaccurate times, and endless frustration.
• The app regularly loses the face id setting so you have to manually log in and enable face id again.
• When you start the app, you have to manually start a log in, because it isn't smart enough to know whether it's logged in or not. Most apps will automatically identify if a login is needed and attempt to log you in via face id.
• Using the offline data feature, the data often won't sync with main servers, resulting in lost clocks. New visits won't show up unless you manually download the data again.
• The web app is not a responsive design and you lose fields and parts of your view based on your screen size. In 2022, responsive design should be part of any web site, especially those used by businesses.
• There are no alert features on the app or web site. There should be options to sent a text or alert if your schedule is changed. Currently, the schedulers have to make a phone call or email the RN to let then know a change has been made. Obviously this is inefficient.
• You can't look up a patient's future visits in the IOS app.
• The IOS app is essentially unusable if you are on a LTE or have less than 3 bars on 5g
• The login screen says "Log in or Log out" Just more evidence that the app doesn't know it's own status.
• No setting to change the amount of time before you are logged out. This means you are almost always logged out of the app or website before you even finish a visit.

Incentivized

• ClearCare does experience times when the system glitches. You cannot add or edit shifts, see client or caregiver details, nothing. They don't have anything in place that reassures you that they are aware of the problem and are working to fix it. It doesn't usually happen more than a few times a year, but we rely so heavily on this software for the daily operation of our business that even 15 minutes down can prove to be catastrophic.
• You can call tech support, but overall I have found them rather unhelpful. I don't usually stay on hold long enough to get a live person, preferring to send an email if it's not an urgent need. I have been disappointed with the time it takes to resolve issues; the longest I went without a fix was about 8 months. They are pretty slow to change when it's something that has been suggested by the network publically. Moreover, sometimes the changes they implement make things more difficult for us or require features or functionality that we would prefer not to use. For example, they are rolling out a new feature that will allow the caregivers to enter their own availability in the system. We require them to contact the office to change their availability or request time off and plan to do everything we can to keep it that way.
• The mobile version of the administrative site is essentially the desktop version, but tiny. When we are out and about after hours, inevitably we use our cell phones to utilize the software. Any shift adjustments are tedious, as the pop-up box moves around whenever you edit a field. To be fair, I'm not sure that the time and energy it would take to redesign the mobile site would be worth it when we still get all the functionality of the full site, even if it is harder to maneuver.

Incentivized

AlayaCare is the single most frustrating and unreliable app I have ever used.

Incentivized

The website is not a responsive design and does not adapt well to smaller screens or different zoom levels. The IOS app is slow and unreliable

Incentivized

I have used ClearCare for about a year now and have only experienced positive outcomes with the system. It has everything you need from simple note reminders to detailed medial information regarding your client. If anyone in the health field takes the time to view this software, they would be hooked.

Incentivized

The IOS app is almost unusable unless you have at least 3 bars of 5g cell reception

Incentivized

Everything the IOS app does is painfully slow as the app doesn't do anything locally and has to communicate with its servers to execute any function

Incentivized

They are reasonably responsive with simple questions, but when it comes to the software not functioning as expected, resolution is very slow. I had a situation where I would click "cancel" in a scheduling window and it would go ahead and make the change (i.e. I didn't realize a caregiver wasn't actually available or that it would create over time, so I would cancel out of that window to go reevaluate, but when it closed that window, the change would be made regardless). That took 8 months for them to resolve, during which time they released a number of relatively useless updates. Currently, I am waiting for them to fix Safe Mode, which is supposed to give us basic access to personnel and scheduling. A select few clients/caregivers actually show up in this system, rendering it largely useless. I have been waiting since late August without an update or resolution, it is currently mid-February. For software that touts safe mode, I would think they would make sure it's actually functional for all users. They have to advertise it in the network because the software goes down with some frequency, at least every few months.

This is a similar system that was created for organizational purposes for health businesses. Ortho2 is not as user friendly and takes much longer to learn the different ins and outs of the software system. I used it for over six years and still did not use all of the features in the system

Incentivized

• Clock in/out times in AlayaCare are not reliable due to the apps frequent inability to contact it's servers and it's inability to detect whether it's logged in or not.
• Significant nursing hours are wasted waiting on the app to log in or change your clocking status.

Incentivized

• POSITIVE IMPACT: We can access almost any metric related to the business and build reports that allow us to set goals, identify potential issues, maintain oversight, and automate workflows with the report scheduling
• NEGATIVE IMPACT: We've been dealing with the same software bugs for over 5 years now, they slow productivity, create room for user error, require workarounds to be created, you name it, just a lot of work to make the platform's shortcomings better since they refuse to do it for us