Evidence for a council fee uplift, from your own costs
What does it actually cost us to care for a council funded resident, and how far is the council's rate below it?
Upload your accounts and resident list. Ask Orrery works out your cost of care per resident a week, sets it against the council's rate and its history against pay, and builds an evidence pack.
When people use it: When the council consults on its fee uplift, usually January to March.
How it works, step by step
Upload accounts and residents
Your own costs carry more weight in a consultation than national averages.
Your cost against the rate
Show staff costs per resident a week separately: it is the part the council can least dispute.
The council's record
Each year's rate rise against the pay rise.
Other councils
Neighbouring councils' rates.
What you upload
- Management accounts
- Residents and fees list
Files are stored privately for your account, never shared with anyone and never used to train AI. You can delete them at any time. Spreadsheets, CSV, PDF and Word files all work, in your own layout.
Try it with sample files
Made up files for a made up provider, Example Care Group, so you can see what Ask Orrery does with them.
Questions you can ask
- “Using my Example House profit and loss and residents list, what is my cost of care per resident a week, and how does Kent's council residential and nursing rate compare? Include the council rate's rises against the National Living Wage since 2021.”
- “Build a two page evidence report for the council's fee consultation.”
Ask the data in plain English
A real question and answer from Ask Orrery, the assistant inside the platform, using the Example Care Group sample files above (October 2026). It works from your files and Orrery's data, and shows its sources.
Your average cost of care is about £1,212 per resident a week. Kent's council rates are £1,187 for residential and £1,378 for nursing.
Your cost of care
- Source: your Example House profit and loss, April to September 2026, and your residents list.
- Total costs were £1,626,105 over 9,395 resident days, which is about 1,342 resident weeks. That gives £1,212 a week.
- September alone was £1,159.
- The profit and loss is before rent, depreciation and group charges, so this is running cost only.
Rough split (my estimate, not in your files)
- Your list shows 36 residential and 17 nursing residents.
- Costs excluding nurse pay come to about £1,004 a week for every resident.
- If all nurse pay is assigned to nursing residents, nursing costs about £1,652 a week.
- That ignores nurses working on residential floors, so please check it against your own allocation.
Against Kent's rates (2026 Q3)
- Residential: £1,187, which is about £17 above the £1,004 estimate.
- Nursing: £1,378 plus Funded Nursing Care of £260.15 (the figure in your file) is £1,638, about £14 below the £1,652 estimate.
- All 23 Kent and Medway council residents on your list are charged exactly these rates.
- Orrery's policy timeline gives Funded Nursing Care as £267.68 from April 2026, so check your £260.15.
Council rate against the National Living Wage I only hold Kent's rates from 2024 Q3, so I cannot show 2021 to 2024.
| National Living Wage (hourly) | Kent residential (weekly) | Kent nursing (weekly) | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2021 | £8.91 | not held | not held |
| 2024 (rate from 2024 Q3) | £11.44 | £1,063 | £1,240 |
| 2025 (rate from 2025 Q3) | £12.21 | £1,187 | £1,378 |
| 2026 | £12.71 | £1,187 | £1,378 |
- Since 2021 the National Living Wage is up 42.7%.
- Since 2024 it is up 11.1%. Kent's residential rate is up 11.6% and its nursing rate 11.2%.
- Kent's rates have not changed since 2025 Q3, so they did not rise with April 2026's 4.1% wage increase.
Sources: Orrery trend data (DHSC returns), Orrery's Kent report and policy timeline. Open in Orrery: /app/councils/kent/explore?m=fee_res and /app/councils/kent/explore?m=fee_nur. The "council-uplift-evidence" guide fits if you want to use this with the council.
Ask, chart and report, in plain English
Ask Orrery answers from Orrery's data and your own files, draws charts on request and builds reports you can save as PDF. These are real examples made with the sample files.
- Include a reasonable return on capital: a rate that only covers running costs does not keep homes open.
Answer this with your own files
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