Your First 30 Days with Sentinel Four: Enrollment Step by Step

Enrollment with Sentinel Four takes about two to three weeks once your documents and regional center authorizations are in hand. It follows five steps, and the first payroll or purchase cannot happen until two things exist: a signed spending plan and matching authorizations. This article walks the 30 days in order.

Before day one: the deadline that sets everything else

We need your signed and regional-center-approved spending plan by the 10th of the month before your intended start date. Authorizations from the regional center should be in place the week before start. Your regional center may have its own deadline as well; some ask for FMS paperwork 15 days before start. If you are still choosing between FMS providers, how to choose an FMS has the questions to ask.

Service coordinators and independent facilitators can refer a family to us directly with a draft spending plan. We can start the consultation before the plan is final. We cannot pay anything until it is signed and authorized.

Step 1: Initial consultation

Your dedicated case manager reads the spending plan with you, confirms the regional center authorizations that match it, and settles the start dates for each service. This is where the model gets confirmed: Bill Payer, Co-Employer or Sole Employer. Most families who hire their own caregivers use Co-Employer. The consultation is also where we surface anything that will not work as written, such as a wage line that leaves no room for employer burden, so it can be fixed before it delays go-live.

What you bring: the spending plan, the names of anyone you plan to hire or pay, and the start date you want.

Step 2: Onboarding

This is the paperwork step, and it is where most of the two to three weeks goes.

• Enrollment documents are signed through DocuSign. You will get an email; nothing is mailed.
• Caregiver documents for each caregiver: onboarding forms and wage notices. We collect these and set each caregiver up in ADP, our payroll system. Any caregiver giving direct personal care needs criminal background clearance before starting; we direct people to fingerprinting. Same-home family members are exempt. See background checks for SDP caregivers.
• Vendor details for each agency or business: a W-9 and a vendor agreement with banking details for ACH.
• Portal access. You receive your login to the secure portal.

What you supply: signatures, contact details for every caregiver and vendor, and quick answers when we chase a missing form. Missing paperwork is the usual reason onboarding runs long.

What your case manager does: sends the documents, tracks what is back, follows up with caregivers and vendors, and tells you exactly what is outstanding.

Step 3: Implementation

Your case manager maps the spending plan to regional center service codes, sets up payroll for each caregiver and the vendor payment system for each vendor, and builds your budget in the portal so every dollar in the plan has a category and a balance. From this point you can log in and see the budget you will be spending from. If you want the background on the two documents, individual budget vs spending plan explains them.

Step 4: Go-live

On the start date, caregivers begin work and clock in and out on the AxisCare app on their own phone or device. Invoices and purchase requests go to your case manager. Payroll runs weekly, with paydays every Monday. Vendors are paid by ACH or check on a predictable cycle after their invoices are validated. See how caregiver payroll works.

Two rules to remember: an caregiver who starts before their clearance and paperwork are done cannot be paid for those hours until they are, and a purchase outside the spending plan cannot be paid at all.

Step 5: Ongoing support and reporting

After go-live, you receive budget reports, including the monthly expenditure report every FMS must provide: what was allocated, what was spent in the last 30 days and what remains. Your case manager stays the same person. Compliance documentation, including anything the regional center asks for, is handled here.

A 30-day timeline

• Days 1 to 3: consultation, model confirmed, document packets sent.
• Days 3 to 14: DocuSign signatures, caregiver and vendor paperwork, background clearances under way, portal login issued.
• Days 14 to 21: spending plan mapped, budget live in the portal, payroll and vendors set up.
• Start date: go-live.
• The Mondays that follow: paychecks on the regular weekly schedule.

These are typical spans, not promises. A family that returns everything in the first week can go faster. One missing clearance can hold a single caregiver while everyone else starts.

How Sentinel Four handles this

Every family gets one dedicated case manager for the whole process and afterward, not a call center. The portal gives 24/7 access to your budget, invoices, approvals and payment records, and it is live from Step 3, before your first payroll. Payroll is weekly with paydays every Monday, and under the Co-Employer and Sole Employer models caregivers receive a $2.50 per-pay-period reimbursement for clocking in on their own phone. We take families of any budget size. Full details are on our process page.