Daily pay tools — or products that help at-home care providers pay their workers quickly and in a more flexible manner — remain a hot topic.

In recent months, the CEOs of several at-home care companies have debated the value of daily pay and its potential for keeping caregivers happy. While some believe daily pay holds substantial promise as a main recruitment and retention tactic, others view it as a smaller piece of the workforce puzzle.

Family Directed — the tech-powered home care player reviving HomeHero — is the latest to explore the topic. The Louisville, Kentucky-based company recently polled its nationwide community of more than 25,000 caregivers, sharing results with Home Health Care News.

Based on feedback from about 400 individuals, Family Directed found that only 21.4% of caregivers prefer a job with a daily-pay option. 

“While daily pay is a valuable benefit, it isn’t the magic bullet to solve the recruiting and retention crisis,” Family Directed President Kiel Dowlin told HHCN. “Caregivers are looking for real-time and transparent communication so they can work additional hours, reduce absences and take cases that fit their skill set.”

A diverse group of caregivers from all over the country participated in the daily-pay poll, according to Dowlin. More than half had at least six years of prior caregiving experience.

In addition to shedding light on caregivers’ perception of daily pay, Family Directed explored other economic trends as well, such as the use of payday-lending services and participation in the gig economy.

Overall, one-quarter of caregivers polled by Family Directed said they have worked for Uber (NYSE: UBER), Lyft (Nasdaq: LYFT), GrubHub (NYSE: GRUB) or for similar gig-economy companies. More than 11% reported work experience with Amazon (Nasdaq: AMZN), UPS (NYSE: UPS), FedEx (NYSE: FDX) or another warehouse job.

Additionally, 23% of caregivers reported having a second job that isn’t caregiving.

Meanwhile, 16% said they have used a payday-lending service.

Family Directed’s business model includes a consumer-facing offering focused on connecting older adults and caregivers, in addition to a HomeHero-branded enterprise offering that helps traditional home care agencies with mobile-workforce optimization.

The company officially launched the enterprise platform on Oct. 25 and already onboarded its first client, according to Dowlin.

“HomeHero’s initial entry point is solving one of the biggest issues in homecare — mobile workforce optimization,” he said. “We constantly hear that schedulers don’t have enough caregivers and caregivers don’t have enough hours. Well, we solve that.”