Orpea indicates that it wants to make these reimbursements, saying that it is “anxious to turn the page on the mistakes of the past and to resume full cooperation with the authorities”. The group of private nursing homes, in the grip of financial difficulties, announced on Tuesday in a press release that it finally agreed to reimburse all of the 55.8 million euros of public money which is claimed from it under its bad past practices, most of which it has until now contested.
These amounts are due to the National Solidarity Fund for Autonomy (CNSA). In July, the group announced that it only agreed to reimburse 25.7 million euros, out of the 55.8 million claimed.
This amount corresponded to the end-of-year discounts granted by its suppliers for purchases that had been financed by Social Security, but also to the amount of two taxes and insurance costs that the group had included in its calculations to claim public subsidies.
On the other hand, Orpea has so far contested the rest of the restitution claimed, i.e. 30.1 million euros, corresponding to the remuneration of certain employees of the group who “acted as” caregivers without having the qualification.
“A general context of shortage of caregivers”
The CNSA considers that these salaries cannot be paid for by the public authorities since the people concerned are not caregivers. The company, on the other hand, has maintained until now that there was no other solution than to hire people without qualifications, “in a general context of a shortage of caregivers”. And that it was therefore legitimate for their salaries to be financed by Social Security, especially since it is, according to her, “a generalized practice in private and public nursing homes”.
The new management of Orpea, which on November 15 presented a plan to get the group of private retirement homes back on track, has therefore decided to give in on this second point as well, while announcing that it wants to “implement solutions to sustainably respond to the problem of carers serving nursing assistants”.
Since September, the company has managed to hire 800 people on permanent contracts each month, which is much more than the 550 hoped for, she adds in the press release.
Orpea also intends to train 1,000 work-study apprentices in 2024, compared to 200 this year and will “support and take charge of the training” of its current “functioning employees”, so that they become caregivers via apprenticeship or validation of acquired experience (VAE), detailed management.