How can social care providers better control their spend?

Your finance team plays a key role in the functioning of your care organisation; controlling costs, chasing aged debt and managing payroll being just some of the vital tasks they undertake to help keep your service ticking over.

So, in this article, we’re looking at the sorts of challenges social care organisations may face when managing their spend, and some key strategies for spend management in care.

What are the challenges when controlling spend in social care?

• Changing needs

No two days in social care are the same. So, understandably, it can be incredibly difficult to predict what your service will need and budget for it. For instance, your clients likely have a wide range of different care requirements, your staffing or occupancy levels may fluctuate. All this can make it hard to plan what your organisation’s spend will look like and then adapt when things ultimately change.

And as our population grows and ages, those requiring care will likely have more complex needs. So perhaps you’re wanting to branch out your care offering to provide different support, expand to new locations, invest in additional equipment or specialist training for your teams. But this will of course need financial planning and budgeting to prepare for.

• Meeting demand

A record 2.1 million requests for adult social care were made in 2023/24. And as demand for care increases, many care providers are likely finding it harder to allocate resources in order to meet it. In a recent survey, less than a quarter of social care Directors (24%) were fully confident that their budgets will allow them to meet the care and support needs of people aged 65 years and above, whilst 21% were confident for people aged 18-64.

Considering and adapting your plans to address retention issues, all while staying within your budget limits, is likely going to be an ongoing challenge in many care organisations as demand and cost for care continues to rise.

• Manual processes

Almost one in three (30%) CFOs told us in our Care Trends Report 2025 their service heavily utilise spreadsheets to manage financial information. And when you’re relying on manual processes to manage spend, human error, duplication or missing receipts can mean your team spends even more time and effort managing your organisation’s finances. Spreadsheets are also hindered by the fact that they do not provide data in real time so are out-of-date from the moment the file is created.

Plus, when you’re working from low quality data you may not be able to accurately see just how your organisation is managing spend, such as where your priority areas are or what you may need to budget for going forward. Without high-quality data accessible in a unified format, organisations can then struggle to properly control spend in social care.

3 key strategies for better spend management in social care

For organisations wondering how to control spend in social care, adopting practical strategies can create a significant impact. Here are three key focus areas:

1. Put an end to maverick spend

One way you can get more control of your outgoings is to manage maverick spend. As you will know, maverick spend refers to any unauthorised payments someone may make, such as for travel arrangements or stationary top ups.

And when these expenses aren’t carefully monitored, unapproved spend can go unnoticed or it could be that the products or services they are paying for aren’t to the quality you’ve come to expect from your registered suppliers. For instance, you may have specific requirements for your suppliers to have a sustainability initiative, so it’s important that your employees order from them rather than elsewhere.

Having an accurate way to approve spend before it happens, whilst having clear visibility of how your budget is being allocated in real-time, can help your organisation keep its financial planning more efficient and responsive to your changing needs.

Take a look at our blog ‘The hidden costs of finance errors in social care’ for more information.

2. Enhance your data quality

When you haven’t got precise figures when you need it, how can you be sure your service is keeping in budget or is able to react if unprecedented changes were to happen?

Having all your accounting needs in one place helps to ensure a single source of truth. Robust software solutions built with the social care sector in mind, can give you a clear view of your entire purchasing management processes. That way, you can track the performance of your organisation’s purchase requisitions against your budget as it comes through, meaning you’re no longer caught off guard by unexpected costs.

3. Streamline your bookkeeping process

Bookkeeping can take up a significant amount of time, especially if your organisation relies on manual processes to manage your financial data. 40% of CFOs even told us their number one priority for their finance team in the next 12 months is reducing the amount of time they spend amending inaccuracies.

When you can streamline bookkeeping, financial processes become more accurate and efficient, so instead of having to spend hours a month amending errors and looking for matching receipts, your team can focus on other key priorities.

Financial Management software for managing spend in social care

Financials allows your finance team to accurately manage all elements of accounting, such as a flexible general ledger, accounts payable and bank reconciliation. And by having all your financial processes managed in one place, it means you can access real-time reports, drilling down into key financial information at the click of a button.

Financials is our cloud-based financial management software for social care that allows your finance teams to manage all accounting processes whenever they need it. Financials can seamlessly integrate with our Procurement and Spend Management solution too, so you can confidently tackle financial challenges and optimise cost control in social care in one place.