Easy Home: Thoughtful Service Helps you to settle the household cores

1. Innovative Easy Home Service Paving the Effective Employment for Needy mid-aged Ladies Timothy Ma Executive Director Senior Citizen Home Safety Association Hong Kong SAR, China Easy Home: Thoughtful Service Helps you to settle the household cores

2. Total Area (sqkm)1,104 Population 7,122,508 Median age 42.8 Life Expectancy 82.04 (2nd longest) Population Growth Rate 0.45% GDP per Capita $45,900 Inflation Rate 4.5% Labor Force 3,700,000 Unemployment Rate 4.6%(July 11 3.2%) Literacy 93.5% Key Facts - Hong Kong(2010)

3. In 2010, the unemployment rate in Hong Kong was 4.6%. The Enforcement of Minimum Wage with effect from May 1, 2011 leading to increase of mid-aged (45 – 59) unemployment (+0.9% to 3.8%) In July 2011, the total unemployment rate drops to 3.2% Unemployment rate of mid-aged

4. Since 1992, Employee Retraining Board was established to cope with: -- high unemployment due to change of economic situation -- change of trade types – from manufacturing to servicing -- new arrivals looks for inclusive employment -- Migration of factories to China leading to huge lay off of local labour B. Employee Retraining Strategies / Policy

5. The Employees Retraining Board (ERB) is an independent statutory body established in 1992 under the Employees Retraining Ordinance. The main function of the ERB is to co-ordinate, to fund, and to monitor appointed training bodies to offer training courses and services designed to meet the growing needs and rapid changes in the labour market. The ERB currently appoints 128 training bodies with around 420 training centres providing services throughout the territory. Employee Retraining Board

6. Certificate in Local Domestic Helper Training Courses Certificate in Massage for Healthcare Training Courses (Additional requirements and different registration procedure) Certificate in Post-natal Care Worker Training Courses Certificate in Infant and Child Care Worker Training Courses Certificate in Elderly Home Care Worker Training Courses Certificate in Personal Care Worker Training Courses Certificate in Escort Service for Out-patient Visit Training Courses Certificate in Home Care Worker for Discharged Patients Training Courses Smart Living Courses run by ERB

7. Household Cleaning Tips offer by Smart Living Net -- Blackening around the edges of the water basin Place a cotton pad soaked in a solution of household bleach on the blackened area and wait for 2-3 hours until the black is removed. Rinse with water. -- Dust on the Ceiling Clean the ceiling with pantyhose since the static electricity generated by pantyhose attracts dust. Work from the centre outwards to the edges. Noticeable stains can be removed by rubbing the surface gently with fine sandpaper. Do not wipe with a damp cloth as this will leave stains. -- Chewing gum on carpet Place some ice cubes in a plastic bag and put the bag over the chewing gum, causing it to harden. After removing the chewing gum, clean the carpet with dry-cleaning detergent. ERBOn-line Tips to Customers

8. For the past 19 years, ERB has trained: -- More than 110,000 Smart Living Helpers -- More than 200,000 successfully taking language, computer courses -- more than 100 Special training courses for specific type of trade, e.g. Installation for Life-line service, Call Centre Operators, etc. --provided huge supply of trained teammates for Easy Home Service ERB Achievements

9. After training, the retrainee has to sustain a job for at least three months, More than 75% of the retrainees from a class should be placed with a job If not, the Training Body will be disqualified for further training fund and courses Easy Home pools the market demand to the retrainees by territory wide marketing campaign ERB Requirements

10. -- not sizable work force preventing from scalable marketing and promotion -- district based -- not connected to a territory wide job market information -- low intention to work after getting the retraining allowance -- have to wait for referral and job placement -- flat rate of reward discouraging the incentive -- too picky on job types – x odd hours, x cooking, x dirty jobs C. Hurdles leading to Under Performance on Job Placement

11. A.1.1 million of aged 60 or above in HK B. More and more singly lived elderly C. 40,000 new born babies a year D. Working Couple increased leading to high demand on home helper (Though HK has already a 300,000 overseas home help maids, mainly from Philippines, Indonesia and Thailand), the demand is still growing up D. Emerging Needs of Home Care & Home Support Service

12. -- not sizable active work force preventing from scalable marketing and promotion -- district based due to boundary of service -- only demand for 75% employment rate in six months, not sustainable enough All the above created the social need for the innovative initiatives of Easy Home Pitfalls of the ERB Policy

13. -- Not connected to a territory wide job market information Introduced A territory wide promotion and job matching & information system via mobile phone -- Low intention to work after getting the retraining allowance -- Have to wait for referral and job placement An integrated ICT and call Centre service to offer referral and job matching service -- Flat rate of reward discouraging the incentive Introducing varied service fee for different job types -- Too picky on job types – x odd hours, x cooking, x dirty jobs Education and workshop to expand and motivate the retrainees to take up jobs and willing to care for the elderly Features of Easy Home Service Model Innovative Responding Approaches

14. Innovation to response to a social need – matching and connecting the used manpower with the needy elders Financial Viability – a fee-charged service not only rendering income for teammates, but also operation surplus for the growth of service Easy Home – As a Social Enterprise

15. Easy Home as a Social Enterprise • A large-scale social enterprise operated by Senior Citizen Home Safety Association and partially funded by • EasyHome aims to provide reliable, efficient and tailor-made “one stop” high quality household management services in response to the need of local market. • As a social enterprise, the service also takes this chance to carry out the social responsibility by providing working opportunities for people who have completed the re-training program.

16. Easy Home Objectives • Provide professional, tailor-made and customer-oriented household management services which enable our service users to enjoy healthy fashionable and carefree lifestyle. • Develop an innovative, sustainable and economic efficient business model so as to provide worthwhile service with continuous improvement.

17. Develop a career prospect, build and maximize the capacity of home helpers by aligning the support from vocational retraining bodies, enabling them to achieve self reliance. Facilitate the development of household management service market by providing a platform for the collaboration and synergy among various counterparts within the sector. Easy Home Objectives

18. Service contents

19. 「管家易聯絡及通訊系統」(EasyJob ICT System) Job matching system Job dispatch and bidding system Website and personal account system Sim Toolkit application and SMS gateway Service delivery tracking system Location-based tracking system

20. 13 Training Bodies on Easy Home Teammates training )they should be graduates of Smart Living Helper Training and accredited with a cert) Communicating Service Limited – CSL, developing a sim card for helpers to receive new job orders / referrals Convenient Stores, e.g. 7 -11 to receive payments Elderly homes requesting Escorting service Customers – elders requiring home care support service Easy Home Teammates Insurance underwriters for Employee Insurance MPF underwriters for Mandatory Provident Fund Media – for promotion and coverage Professional bodies for further training (e.g. HKADA, HKOTA, etc.) Stake holders of Easy Home Service contributing to a successful social enterprise

21. Service Achievements at a GlanceAs of May 31, 2011

22. 1. Integrated ICT facilitate job referrals, job orders and job matching 2. On-line customer feedback and orders 3. Varied service fee to award higher degree of service, so encouraging helpers to on more high level service 4. Territory-wide job information and opportunities 5. Provide employee insurance and MPF 6. Quality assurance via on-line and on-site feedback from users 7. Convenient payment gateway at 7-11 Successful features of the Easy Home Service

23. Conduct Consumption pattern & Use of Money Study for the teammates Offer training workshop in collaboration of Finance Management Expertise to advise them the proper finance management Offer regular skill uplifted courses – caring for demented elders Offer tea gathering for teammates to meet and share Professional Social Workers also available for their family or other needs All these sustain their loyalty to the service Value added Care and Support to Teammates – A caring social enterprise

24. Work Skills – more professional to related elders, such as dementia care Work Attitudes – hotel class house keeping, remind users to add supplies proactively Avoid embarrassment on personnel conflict with supervisor – request for leave via on-line Commendations from service users – thoughtful, care, friendly One stop for job referral, matching and payment gateway – users can pay service fee at any convenient stores Repositioning an elite image for the teammates SE Creating Impacts

25. Manpower supplies unevenly distributed – leading to shortage of teammates at certain district Locality issue – teammates don’t want to be assigned to work cross districts Increase of ad hoc and urgent demand – a Happy Problem Too many better offer of attraction to teammates Increasing demand on supply Upcoming Challenges

26. A. Upcoming Elder Coupons enable elders to make more use of home support care B. Extension of pilot home care for frail elders by Labour & Welfare Bureau, HKSAR C. Private home for elder compete for customers by using more out-sourced escort service D. New Opportunities due to policy changes

27. Questions / Suggestions welcome Future contact: Timothy Ma Email: timothy@schsa.org.hk Phone: 852 9038 0545 Q & A

28. 地址 ：香港九龍觀塘巧明街97號 旭日集團大廈2樓 電話查詢：2345 4455 傳真查詢：3520 4425 網頁 ：http://www.ezhome.com.hk