Any ideas for grocery shopping when elderly parent can no longer drive?

Wyndham

Zinger549 said:

Iceland do home delivery service in-store. You do your shopping as normal, pay at the till and then pick a delivery slot.

That is certainly worth looking into, and may just work. She can still pick things herself (so has the independence I think she doesn't want to lose), but gets help where she needs it. Thank you!

teaselMay

The problem with the teenager helping idea will be car insurance. They'd need cover that included carrying a paying passenger, that's going to be extortionate for a teenager. Someone helping and them both getting a taxi circumvents that issue

Blue_Doggy

Could you set up a delivery facility with their favoured supermarket? Then they give you their shopping list and preferred delivery date & time*, you do the online shop for them, and it’s delivered to their home.
 

My friend used to do this for her father (she lived in Southampton and her father in Rugby) and it worked very well for both of them. 
 
*obviously there’d have to be some wiggle room scheduling this, unless the supermarket allows a regular delivery slot to be arranged.

elsien

You are not going to get an adult social care assessment just for a bit of shopping.  Many care agencies also do home visits and care but not support with shopping.
As a starting point, see if Age UK offer anything in your area.
Food and grocery shopping help for the elderly | Age UK

Otherwise check out  care agencies  - national ones such as Helping Hands (not a recommendation as I've not used them but it is something they offer) or ask on local social media for recommendations. 
You can check out any agency on the CQC website although the ratings may be out of date. 
Find homecare agencies - Care Quality Commission

Or there  may be a local individual - you need references and a current DBS. That's how parent found her cleaner - word of mouth via friends of a similar age. 

elsien

Blue_Doggy said:

Could you set up a delivery facility with their favoured supermarket? Then they give you their shopping list and preferred delivery date & time*, you do the online shop for them, and it’s delivered to their home.
 

My friend used to do this for her father (she lived in Southampton and her father in Rugby) and it worked very well for both of them. 
 
*obviously there’d have to be some wiggle room scheduling this, unless the supermarket allows a regular delivery slot to be arranged.

His mother wants to continue doing this herself, rather than online.

camelot1001

My elderly Aunt phones Morrisons and they deliver the next day. She would be unable to shop on line and this works well for her.
She still goes to the shops if someone can take her.

lr1277

There is more than one organisation where people can help with things like this:

1) Age UK have people you can pay for. Contact your nearest branch if it is a suitable distance. My aunt has an Age UK person come in and do her cleaning. I am sure they would be able to take somebody shopping.

2) There are care agencies that provide care at home. However we found one of these care agencies to take my dad to the park for a walk once a week. I can't remember how we found the agency other than going through Yellow Pages. Then we interviewed the candidate agencies.

Edited to add: Dad usually got the same carer, but sometimes another carer would come along to do the job.

And I think once the carer was late because their previous client had injured themselves so they had to wait till the ambulance came. I have no idea on the timings of the person used by my aunt.

When my dad needed home based care as he was bed bound, the local social services (possibly based at the county council) gave us the name of a couple of local agencies. One was the agency we used before but they were a few pounds an hour more expensive than the 2nd agency recommended. We tried the 2nd agency and they were good. A little harder to contact but the staff were excellent.

The older people's GP might have an idea which part of the (county) council to contact to get recommendations for care agencies.

Rosalynda

I  had never used online for shopping until Covid arrived. I bit the bullet and had a go. First i used Tesco and was very stressed, but now i use it at least once a month. Also Iceland. Their site is easy to use. Hope you get it sorted.

comeandgo

Check for any charities that can help, local charities rather than national.  In our area we have one, they pick up the elderly person, assist in the shopping and take them home all for the cost of £2.

elsien

That is a good suggestion. If your mother can get help in the supermarket then if there is a local dial a ride type system that would be cheaper than a taxi, if she wanted to she could make a couple of smaller trips rather than one big one.