Careswitch helps you pay caregivers for mileage and travel time. You can manage each separately, with its own settings and rates. For example, you can pay for travel time between visits without reimbursing mileage.
Your collection settings apply across your workspace. You can also choose whether mileage and travel time appear on each private payer's invoices.
As you set up your policies, keep these two distinctions in mind:
Mileage and travel time have separate settings.
Caregiver pay and client billing are managed separately. What you pay a caregiver can be different from what you charge a client.
For help with client billing, see Expenses, mileage, and rate modifiers on a bill.
Quick reference: common setups
You can find all of these options under Settings → Policies:
Pay travel time between clients without paying mileage: set Travel Time to Automatic — between shifts and Travel Mileage to Admin Entry.
Automatically pay both for travel between clients: set both to Automatic — between shifts.
Also pay for travel from home and back home: use Automatic — including commute. You can pair this with a daily deductible to treat the first miles or minutes of the day as the caregiver's regular commute.
Let caregivers enter their own mileage or travel time: use Caregiver Entry.
Pay caregivers without charging the client: keep collection on and set the Bill Rate to $0.00.
Bill using caregiver entries and pay using automatic estimates: set Billing Collection to Caregiver Entry and Payroll Collection to an Automatic mode. See “Separate collection for billing and payroll” below.
Add mileage or travel time only when needed: choose Admin Entry. Careswitch won't collect it automatically or ask caregivers to enter it. Office staff can still add it to individual shifts.
Where to find the settings
Mileage and travel time each have their own section on the Policies page:
Settings → Policies → Travel Mileage — for miles driven between work locations. Miles driven during a shift, such as taking a client to an appointment, are recorded as expenses instead. Use the Errand Mileage expense type under Settings → Policies → Expenses. This expense type is off by default.
Settings → Policies → Travel Time — for travel time settings.
To change these settings, you need the Policies → Manage settings permission. Workspace admins have this permission automatically. Users with view-only access to Policies can see the settings, but won't see the Edit button.
Both pages include Billing Collection and Payroll Collection methods, a caregiver Pay Rate, a client Bill Rate, and a daily deductible for payroll. The Travel Time page also has two additional options, explained below.
Separate collection for billing and payroll
You can choose different collection methods for billing and payroll for both mileage and travel time. For example, you can bill a payer using the mileage a caregiver enters, while paying the caregiver using an automatic estimate. You can also collect information for one side without collecting it for the other.
When billing and payroll use different methods, the settings page reminds you that a shift may have different billed and reimbursed amounts.
At clock-out, the caregiver app asks only for the information your collection settings require. If caregiver entry is used for only one side, the app explains what the entry is for. For example: “This entry is collected for billing. Payroll is calculated separately.”
How to change a setting
Go to Settings → Policies and click Edit next to Travel Mileage or Travel Time.
Choose a collection method for billing and for payroll. You'll see a short description of each selected method below its dropdown.
Set the rates:
Pay Rate — the amount paid to the caregiver, per mile for mileage or per hour for travel time. This rate applies to every collection method, including Admin Entry.
Bill Rate — the amount charged to the client. Set it to $0.00 if you don't charge for mileage or travel time. Leaving the field blank won't remove an existing rate.
If needed, set a daily deductible. See “Daily deductibles (payroll only)” below.
Click Save.
If you set mileage pay below the federal mileage reimbursement rate or travel-time pay below the federal minimum wage ($7.25), Careswitch displays a Risk Warning. The warning asks you to review the rate, but doesn't prevent you from saving. A higher state or local minimum wage may apply to travel time. Enter your state's minimum if it is higher.
Important: collection and rate changes apply only to shifts completed after you save. They don't update shifts that are already completed. On the Travel Time page, the same rule applies to changes to the maximum gap. See “How setting changes affect completed shifts” below.
Daily deductibles are the exception: changing a deductible recalculates the current open pay period.
The five collection modes
Travel Mileage and Travel Time offer the same five options. Choose a method separately for billing and payroll:
Admin Entry — office staff add mileage or travel time to a shift when needed. Nothing is collected automatically, and caregivers aren't asked to enter it.
Caregiver Entry — caregivers enter mileage or travel time when they clock out.
Automatic — between shifts — Careswitch uses Google to estimate travel between back-to-back shifts on the same day. This mode doesn't automatically include travel to the first shift of the day or the drive home.
Automatic — including commute — Careswitch estimates travel from the caregiver's home to the first shift, between shifts, and from the last scheduled shift of the day back home once that shift is completed. Use a daily deductible if you want to exclude the regular commute from caregiver pay.
Caregiver entry + Automatic — between shifts — caregiver entries are used for the first shift of the day. For later back-to-back shifts, the automatic estimate replaces the caregiver's entry.
Daily deductibles (payroll only)
A daily deductible lets you pay for travel above a set number of miles or minutes each day. Deductibles apply only to payroll, regardless of how payroll mileage or travel time is collected. They don't affect billing.
Daily Mileage Deductible — enter miles per day on the Travel Mileage page. The caregiver covers the first miles each day, and miles above that amount are reimbursed. Careswitch applies the deductible to the caregiver's shifts in scheduled start-time order, using your workspace time zone. Travel from home is included in a shift's mileage only when it is captured through Automatic — including commute or entered manually. Leave the field blank to reimburse from the first mile.
Daily Travel Time Deductible — enter minutes per day on the Travel Time page. The first minutes of travel each day are unpaid and don't count toward overtime. Leave the field blank to pay from the first minute.
When a deductible covers part of a shift's mileage, payroll shows both the reimbursable and total recorded miles. For example: Mileage · 12 of 42 mi (30 mi daily deductible).
If the deductible covers all of a shift's travel, that shift won't show a mileage or travel time line on payroll. The shift page will note that the miles or time were recorded, but none was reimbursed.
Saving or removing a deductible recalculates payroll for every caregiver in the current open pay period—the period that includes today. This includes scheduled shifts that haven't happened yet. Caregivers whose pay is already processing or paid are skipped, and earlier pay periods stay the same.
If a recalculation doesn't finish, or payroll doesn't reflect the current deductible, click Edit in the Travel Mileage or Travel Time section. Then select Recalculate current pay period at the bottom of the page. This reapplies the current policy to the open pay period without changing your settings.
Travel Time options
The Travel Time page includes two additional options:
Use Caregiver Travel Time Rates — pay travel time using each caregiver's own rate instead of the workspace travel rate. Careswitch uses the travel rate in the caregiver's profile pay configuration. If no travel rate is set, it uses their hourly rate. When this option is on, the workspace rate becomes the Fallback Pay Rate for caregivers who have neither rate. This option applies only to hourly-paid shifts. Daily, live-in, and salaried shifts always use the workspace rate.
Maximum Gap Between Shifts — enter a gap in minutes. Automatic travel time between two same-day shifts is recorded only when the later shift is scheduled to start within that many minutes of the earlier shift's scheduled end. Leave the field blank to record travel time regardless of the gap. This setting applies only to automatic travel time between shifts; it doesn't affect mileage or caregiver and admin entries. With Automatic — including commute, travel from and to home is still recorded, even when travel between shifts is excluded by this setting.
Choosing which payers are billed
You can choose whether mileage, travel time, and expenses appear on each private payer's invoices, even when billing collection is on.
Open the payer's Private Payer Information or a client's Self Pay Information, then click Edit. Under Add-on Reimbursements, check or uncheck Bill for Mileage, Travel Time, and Expenses. All three are on by default.
When you turn one off, new charges of that type are left off that payer's invoices. Other payers and caregiver payroll aren't affected. Turning an option off doesn't remove charges already included on an invoice.
How the Automatic modes work
Between shifts
This mode estimates travel from one visit to the next. When the same caregiver completes one visit and has another later that day, Careswitch calculates the drive between the two clients. It uses driving distance for mileage and driving time for travel time.
Both visits must be completed (clocked out). Careswitch calculates the estimate after both visits are complete. If the later visit is completed first, the estimate is added when the earlier visit is completed.
The schedule determines “same day” and “back-to-back.” A shift's day is its scheduled start date in your workspace time zone. An overnight shift counts toward the day it starts. The previous visit is the caregiver's most recent completed shift that day; canceled shifts and shifts that aren't completed are skipped.
The estimate uses the clients' address coordinates. Careswitch uses the coordinates saved when the caregiver clocked in, rather than the caregiver's phone location. If either visit is missing coordinates, travel between those visits isn't estimated.
The first visit of the day doesn't receive an automatic estimate in this mode. There is no earlier visit to calculate travel from.
The estimate reflects client-to-client travel. It doesn't follow the caregiver's actual route. If the caregiver runs an errand or goes home between visits, the estimate still uses the drive from the first client to the second. Two visits to the same client result in approximately zero mileage or travel time. You can adjust the value on the shift when needed; see “Changing mileage or travel time on a single shift” below.
Careswitch updates the estimate when visits are completed or canceled. It updates the connection to the next visit so the estimate reflects the current sequence of visits. Values office staff have edited on other shifts are preserved.
Including commute
This mode also includes travel from the caregiver's home to the first completed shift of the day, and from the last shift of the day back home. Careswitch uses the home address on the caregiver's profile, or the geofence coordinates set for that address.
Keep these details in mind:
Caregivers need a home address on file. Careswitch's default shift review rules—Missing Caregiver Address for Automatic Billing Mileage, …Billing Travel Time, …Payroll Mileage, and …Payroll Travel Time—flag affected shifts and hold them back from billing or payroll on the affected side. To resolve this, add the home address. Then open the shift and select More → Retry commute calculation to recalculate the commute and run the review again.
The drive home is calculated after the last scheduled shift of the day is completed. It is added to that shift's mileage or travel time. If a later shift is still scheduled, Careswitch waits for it. If the last shift isn't completed, such as a no-show, no drive home is recorded for that day. Adding a later shift moves the drive home to the new last shift.
A daily deductible can exclude the regular commute from pay. Use one if you want to reimburse only travel above the deductible.
How Caregiver Entry works
With Caregiver Entry, caregivers enter mileage, travel time, or both in the mobile app when they clock out of a visit. They must include a short explanation for any amount above zero.
For each side using caregiver entry, the entered amount is used to calculate payroll at your pay rate or billing at your bill rate. This option can be helpful when the travel you want to pay for includes more than a direct drive between clients.
With Caregiver entry + Automatic — between shifts, the app asks for an entry on every shift because it doesn't know in advance which shift will be first. The entry is kept for the first shift of the day. On later shifts, the automatic estimate replaces it. If Careswitch can't calculate an estimate—for example, because coordinates are missing—the caregiver's entry is kept.
Phone clock-outs (IVR) and live-in automatic clock-outs don't ask for mileage or travel time. Automatic modes still calculate travel for those shifts.
How pay is calculated
Mileage pay = reimbursable miles after any daily deductible × the shift's mileage rate.
Travel-time pay = payable time after any daily deductible × the shift's travel-time rate. This is your workspace rate, or the caregiver's own rate when Use Caregiver Travel Time Rates is on.
Paid travel time counts toward overtime. It is included in hours worked and may cause a caregiver to reach overtime. Any travel time that falls into overtime appears as a separate Travel Time (Overtime) line and is paid at the overtime rate. Travel time covered by the daily travel time deductible doesn't count toward overtime. Mileage never counts as hours worked.
Rates are recorded when a shift is completed. Careswitch saves the rate from Settings on the shift when it is completed. If you later change the rate in Settings, completed shifts keep their original rate. Only shifts completed after the change use the new rate. To update a rate on a specific completed shift, edit the rate on that shift as described below.
Client billing is tracked separately and has its own rate. The amount billed can differ from the amount paid to the caregiver.
Where mileage and travel time appear
On a completed shift and on the caregiver's timesheet within a payroll run, mileage and travel time appear as separate lines in the pay breakdown, alongside care hours.
The payroll run page shows totals in the Mileage and Travel Time summary cards. Travel time paid at the overtime rate is included in the Overtime card instead of the Travel Time card.
Changing mileage or travel time on a single shift
You can adjust mileage, travel time, or their rates on a completed shift:
Open the shift, or open the caregiver's timesheet within the payroll run.
Find the Mileage or Travel Time line in the pay breakdown.
Click the ⋮ menu on that line and choose:
Edit Mileage / Edit Travel Time to change the miles or hours and minutes. Set the amount to 0 to remove it.
Edit Mileage Rate / Edit Travel Time Rate to set a custom rate for that shift.
Click Save.
When making changes, keep these details in mind:
You edit the total recorded on the shift before the daily deductible. Careswitch then reapplies the deductible. This may also change the reimbursable amount on the caregiver's other shifts that day.
A custom rate set on a shift stays in place even if you change Settings later. The line indicates that a custom rate is set. To remove it, choose Reset Mileage Rate to Default or Reset Travel Time Rate to Default from the same menu.
If the shift doesn't have a Mileage or Travel Time line, open the shift's ⋮ menu → Add Items. If travel was recorded but fully covered by the deductible, use the Edit link in the note on the shift page.
You can edit a completed shift as long as its pay isn't on a payroll run that is already processing or paid. If your change would affect approved line items, you'll be asked to confirm before saving.
These edits affect payroll only. Billed mileage and travel time are edited separately on the shift.
Command Center can also set mileage, travel time, or rates on the completed shifts you specify, one shift at a time. For example, you can ask it to “set payroll mileage to zero on these shifts.” It won't change pay that has already been approved.
How setting changes affect completed shifts
Changes to a collection method, rate, or travel time maximum gap apply only to shifts completed after you save. Shifts that are already completed keep the values calculated at the time.
To change your policy and update existing shifts:
Change the setting first. For example, switch the payroll collection to Admin Entry.
Update any completed shifts in the current pay period that used the previous setting. Follow the single-shift steps above, or use Command Center.
Daily deductibles work differently: changing a deductible automatically recalculates the current open pay period.
Who can make changes
Settings (Settings → Policies → Travel Mileage / Travel Time) — users with the Policies → Manage settings permission, including workspace admins.
Mileage or travel time on an individual shift — users with permission to manage shifts can edit from the shift page. Users with permission to manage payroll can edit from a timesheet within a payroll run.
FAQ
How do we pay travel time without paying mileage?
Under Settings → Policies, set the Travel Time payroll collection to an Automatic mode and the Travel Mileage payroll collection to Admin Entry. Then remove mileage from any already-completed shifts in the open pay period. The new collection setting won't update those shifts automatically.
How do we pay caregivers without charging the client?
Keep collection on and set the Bill Rate to $0.00 on the settings page. Caregivers will still be paid at your pay rate, and clients won't be charged. Automatically collected and caregiver-entered amounts with a $0.00 bill rate don't create invoice lines.
You can also set billing collection to Admin Entry while keeping payroll collection automatic. To stop mileage or travel time billing for a specific private payer, turn it off on that payer's profile.
Why was a caregiver paid mileage between two clients?
The payroll mileage collection is set to an Automatic mode. This estimates travel between back-to-back visits on the same day. If you want office staff to add mileage only when needed, switch to Admin Entry.
Why didn't the first visit of the day include mileage or travel time?
Automatic — between shifts covers travel from one visit to the next, so it doesn't include travel to the first visit of the day. To include travel from home, switch to Automatic — including commute and make sure the caregiver has a home address on their profile.
Why does a caregiver's first shift show no mileage after we set a daily deductible?
The deductible is applied to the first miles of the day, in shift start-time order. Earlier shifts may have little or no reimbursable mileage, while later shifts include miles above the deductible. This affects payroll only; billed mileage stays the same.
Why wasn't travel time recorded between two shifts?
Check Maximum Gap Between Shifts on the Travel Time page. Automatic travel time isn't recorded if the later shift was scheduled to start more than the allowed number of minutes after the earlier shift's scheduled end. Also make sure both shifts were completed and both clients have address coordinates.
A caregiver went home between clients. Why were they paid for the full client-to-client drive?
Automatic modes estimate the drive from one client to the next, regardless of the caregiver's actual route. To adjust the amount paid, edit the shift using ⋮ → Edit Mileage or Edit Travel Time. You can also use Caregiver Entry to have caregivers report the actual amount.
Why is some travel time included in the Overtime card?
Paid travel time counts toward overtime. When part of that time falls above the caregiver's overtime threshold, it is paid at the overtime rate, appears as Travel Time (Overtime), and is included in the overtime total.
Does changing a rate update past shifts?
No. Each shift's rate is recorded when the shift is completed. Completed shifts keep their original rate, and only shifts completed after the change use the new rate. To change a rate on a specific completed shift, select ⋮ → Edit Mileage Rate or Edit Travel Time Rate on that shift.
Why do older shifts still show mileage after I turned it off?
The setting applies only to shifts completed after the change. To remove mileage from older shifts, select ⋮ → Edit Mileage, set the amount to 0, and click Save. You can also ask Command Center to clear it.
Can caregivers enter mileage or travel time themselves?
Yes. Choose Caregiver Entry or Caregiver entry + Automatic — between shifts. Caregivers enter the amount in the mobile app at clock-out. The app asks only for the information your collection settings require.
Can we pay the caregiver a different amount than we bill the client?
Yes. Caregiver pay and client billing each have their own rate and can use different collection methods. For more information, see Expenses, mileage, and rate modifiers on a bill.
Are mileage and travel time included on insurance claims?
No. Insurance claims bill for care hours worked and don't include mileage or travel time. Mileage and travel time apply to caregiver pay and private-pay billing.