The costs of unpaid labour: the use of voluntary staff in the King's Mill Hospice

This paper provides an analysis of the costs and benefits of employing voluntary staff in a single hospice unit. It forms part of a evaluation of the hospice by a multi-disciplinary research team guided by the methodological principles of formative, qualitative evaluation. Voluntary staff working at the Hospice contributed over 2000 h of unpaid labour in each calendar month. A conservative estimate places the potential cost of the free labour of voluntary staff at the hospice in excess of $108 000 in 1993. Once administrative and training costs have been taken into account the potential savings for the hospice of using voluntary labour was approximately $81 000. It is suggested employing voluntary staff at the hospice is cost effective and that the voluntary staff contribute significantly to the quality of services which patients and their relatives receive at the hospice.