Travel Time and Mileage Agency Settings

Travel time and mileage settings can be found under System > Financial.

Scroll down to the Travel Time and Mileage section. (image will need to be replaced when final changes are made)

Important Concepts and Definitions in eCaring

What is Travel Time?

Travel time laws vary by state, but generally it's the time spent traveling between work locations during a given work day by your staff. In eCaring, the feature actually has multiple components to allow you to optimize functionality for your organization. This includes the ability to set "In-between time" rules as well as "Reasonable time spent traveling".

What is Mileage?

The miles, or distance traveled, between work locations during a give work day by your staff. This does NOT normally include distance driving TO their first shift of the day or home FROM their last shift of the day.

Estimated Travel Time and Mileage

To support optimal scheduling, eCaring estimates travel time and distance distances, those values are displayed throughout scheduling and in the staff search. These values are estimates only and can change based on what ACTUALLY happens throughout a given work day and the driving distance will be calculated using Google Maps only once a visit has reached the "Complete" status. Therefore, it is EXPECTED that the paid values will vary from what you see on scheduled visits.

Definitions:

Shift Reset Gap - The amount of time, in hours, between two shifts that determines whether or not the visits are eligible for Travel Time. This is calculated even across calendar days if the visits times qualify.
- Tip: This value is "less than or equals to". If your reset gap is set to 2 hours, any visits that are 2 hours apart, or less, based on the payroll approval times will be eligible for travel time.
Default Rate - The standard amount your agency compensates a caregiver for travel time.
- Tip: If a Travel Time rate is configured on a caregiver's profile, that rate will be used instead of the rate defined above. If you leave this field blank, you MUST configure a Travel Time rate for each staff member.
In-between Time - sometimes referred to as "wait time" - this is defined as the maximum amount of time between two shifts where your agency chooses to pay for the entirety of the time.
- Tip: This value is typically set to a short duration where the caregiver could not complete any personal tasks due to the short gap between two shifts.
- Tip: This value is "less than or equals to". If your value is 20 minutes, any visits that are 20 minutes apart, or less, based on payroll approval times will be eligible for In-between time.
Reasonable time spent traveling - This time, calculated by eCaring using Google Maps routing with the shortest distance between two shifts, is how the payable travel time and mileage is calculated for payroll purposes.
Mileage Related to Travel - This is the distance traveled associated with the travel time, eCaring uses Google Maps to determine this when a visit reaches the "Complete" status.

How are the settings applied?

Step 1. Initial Check

Is "Pay for travel between visits" checked?
- NO → No pay for travel, in-between time, or mileage
- YES → Proceed to step 2

Step 2. Shift Gap Validation

Is time between shifts <= Shift Reset Gap?

- NO → No pay for travel, in-between time, or mileage
- YES → Proceed to step 3

Step 3. In-Between Time Processing

Is "Pay for in-between time" checked?
- NO → Skip to step 4.1
- YES → Proceed to step 3.2
Does employee have custom travel time rate?
- YES → Use custom travel time rate
- NO → Use Default Rate
Is time between shifts <= Maximum amount of time for in-between pay?
- YES → Pay for entire time between shifts using rate from step 3.2 and SKIP Step 4 entirely
  - If "In-between Time" is paid, "Reasonable Time Spent Traveling" is NOT paid.
- NO → Proceed to step 4

Step 4. Travel Time Processing

Is "Pay for reasonable time spent traveling" checked?
- NO → No pay for travel time
- YES → Proceed to step 4.2
Does employee have custom travel time rate?
- YES → Use custom travel time rate
- NO → Use Default Rate

Step 5. Mileage Processing

Is "Pay for Mileage Related to travel" checked?
- NO → No mileage reimbursement
- YES → Calculate Mileage Reimbursement

Enabling and Updating Travel Time and Mileage Settings

Upon configuring your Travel Time settings, whether enabling them for the first time, making an update to a setting, or disabling the feature completely. eCaring will perform a task in the background that re-evaluates existing visits in the system that have not been verified and update the travel time and mileage associated with them. This will be most visible when viewing a caregiver's schedule in the "Grid" view.

Upon configuring your settings, when you click "Save Settings" - if you've made any of the following changes you'll be presented with the screen below upon clicking "Save Settings". Clicking "Yes" will start the job and during that time you will not be able to process billing or payroll. You'll also notice that the values on your schedules, etc may change based on your new settings. The time it takes to complete this task varies depending on the number of visits you have, it can take sometime.

Enabled or Disabled the Travel Time feature entirely
Changed the "Shift Reset Gap"
Enabled or Disabled
- "Pay for In-between time"
- "Pay for Reasonable Time Spent Traveling"