How Care Home Groups Can Cut Recruitment Costs to Near Zero (Without Needing To Commit Resource)

Save Money On Recruiting

By Bass Rock Consultancy – Recruitment Systems & ATS Consulting

Across the UK, care home groups are facing the same ongoing problem: recruitment costs keep rising, but hiring results are not improving.

Agencies are expensive. Job boards keep increasing their prices. Home managers are overwhelmed and have no time to handle dozens of CVs. And despite all of this effort, most operators still struggle to hire consistently.

The good news? There is now a proven, practical way to reduce recruitment costs to near zero — not over years, but within a few months — by replacing repetitive admin with smart automation and a modern ATS system.

At Bass Rock Consultancy, we help care groups achieve exactly that.

The Hidden Cost of “Traditional” Recruitment

Most care groups don’t realise how much unnecessary recruitment admin they are paying for.

Typical problems include:

• Dozens of paid job adverts posted manually by home managers

• CVs scattered across emails, folders, Indeed dashboards

• Managers spending 6–10 hours a week screening candidates

• Missed applicants because nobody responds fast enough

• No central database of past applicants

• No tracking of hiring performance or cost per hire

• Hiring decisions based on guesswork, not data

This is not a recruitment problem — it’s a systems problem.

With the right setup, most of this can disappear.

The New Model: Centralised, Automated, Cost-Efficient Recruitment

A modern recruitment system allows care groups to:

1. Stop Paying for Most Job Advertising

Once you build a proper candidate database, you only need to advertise occasionally. Your own database becomes your number one source of hires.

2. Cut Admin Work by 70–90%

AI-powered screening and ATS workflows can:

• Respond instantly to every applicant

• Screen against your own criteria

• Book interviews into managers’ diaries

• Keep candidates warm automatically

• Filter out unsuitable applicants

• Give managers only the best candidates

Managers stop doing admin. They simply interview and hire.

3. Make Every Applicant Count

Care groups often lose 80% of applicants because emails get missed or nobody has time to follow up.

An ATS captures every single applicant and ensures nobody goes cold.

4. Build a Permanent Talent Pipeline

When every CV is saved, tagged and available, you can hire:

• faster

• cheaper

• from your own data

And most importantly — without agencies.

The Financial Impact

Here is what most care groups can realistically achieve within 3–6 months:

• Reduce agency usage by 80–100%

• Cut job board spend by 50–70%

• Lower cost per hire from £800–£2,000 to under £100

• Increase home manager productivity by 5–10 hours per week

• Hire faster and reduce turnover

This isn’t theory — it’s the system I use myself.

Once it’s set up, the system keeps running with almost no manual effort.

How Bass Rock Consultancy Helps

We provide a done-for-you setup that includes:

• Selection of a modern ATS

• Integration with automation tools

• Building automations for candidate screening

• Setting up interview booking workflows

• Connecting calendars

• Email templates, messaging, and branding

• Training for managers

• Ongoing monthly support

Our aim is simple:

Give care home groups a recruitment engine that runs itself — and costs a fraction of agencies or job boards.

No long contracts. No unnecessary complexity. Just practical, measurable results.

If you're a care home director looking to reduce recruitment costs — let’s talk

I’m currently offering a free 20-minute call where we can review:

• your current recruitment spend

• your typical hiring process

• opportunities to reduce cost

• whether automation could work for your group

You can book a slot here:murray@bassrockconsultancy.com

Recruitment doesn’t need to be expensive. It just needs the right system.