Older people taking up personal budgets often face cuts to the level of care they can afford and are forced to do so because it is the only way they can continue to use their familiar care worker, according to new research.
The study from Laing & Buisson also revealed that local authorities have cut spending on homecare services but this has largely been replaced by personalised budgets.
Personal care budgets have raised many concerns from health managers and age charities and the latest revelation is likely to increase these worries.
In March 2010 132,000 people were receiving personal budgets or direct payments, of which 48% were young disabled adults, 12% were older people aged under 75 and 40% were aged over 75.
The research indicated that not all older people who are given personal budgets are willing recipients, with some signing up because it is the only way the user can continue to receive care from their familiar care worker.
And while personal budgets can result in no change in the amount of care given under former funding streams scheme, in other cases the analyst found that the change to a personal budget had resulted in less homecare being afforded to a user.
However, the practice of giving clients greater control on how they receive support is leading to a downward pressure on prices for council-arranged homecare.
Overall, the Domiciliary Care UK Market Report 2011 found an 8% dip in expenditure during 2009-10 compared to the previous year, reversing a 15-year trend of increases.
But it argued this change can be attributed in the main part to the personalisation agenda rather than marking a shift away from central government policy supporting home-based support.
It revealed that local authorities are increasingly struggling to justify the cost of running expensive in-house teams and so independent sector homecare businesses continued to increase their market share.
Philip Mickelborough, author of the report, explained the Dilnot Commission's findings could also impact this sector.
"One of the Dilnot Commission's less-expected recommendations was that the asset threshold for those in residential care beyond which no means-tested help is given should be raised from £23,250 to £100,000," he said.
"While the extended means-test threshold applies only to residential care there could be a knock on effect producing an incentive to use residential care instead of homecare under certain circumstances, such as where a person's assets excluding his house are worth between the threshold for homecare, £23,250, and the proposed residential threshold of £100,000."
