Frequently Asked Questions

Contract lengths vary depending on both the facilities’ needs and your availability, however most contracts average between 4-12 weeks. While some shorter and longer-term contracts are occasionally available, generally speaking, the more flexible and open you can be, the more contract choices and options you will see come your way!

Put simply, contracts for EENs are more infrequent than those for RNs, as contracts for EENs are generally for Aged Care or small rural facilities. While we need and love our EENs, due to the sporadic nature of contracts in rural/remote agency nursing, signing up to a casual pool back home is the best way to ensure your own financial stability.

There are many factors that contribute to an agency nurse’s rate of pay, and so unfortunately there is no one flat rate that will be relevant to you across every contract. There are two types of contracts, and therefore also two types of ways you can be paid: agency rates or placement rates (see below).

Agency rates mean that you will be paid by us (CQ Nurse) each week. These rates are a higher rate of pay up front as they are a casual rate. Placement rates means you will be paid by the facility that you are contracted to and put directly onto their payroll. Facilities generally pay slightly less than agency rates, but also offer the potential to accrue entitlements such as sick leave, annual leave and rostered days off (RDO). Both placement and agency rates can differ depending on state and location (e.g. regional, rural or remote), however you will always be told your rate of pay for each CQ Nurse contract that you undertake prior to officially accepting or declining the position. We will outline the advantages and considerations for both types of contracts for you in more detail during your onboarding process with CQ Nurse.

While this is possible, it can sometimes be difficult to navigate depending on the circumstances. You will find that facilities do not offer any specific travel assistance for family members’ plane fares or pet transport. Most facilities are more than happy for you to travel with your family or loved ones, however you will be required to fund the cost of their travel. Many also offer single-person nurses quarters as their accommodation option, and are often either unable or unwilling to subsidise any alternative accommodation that you may choose to stay in, and therefore such accommodation will be at your own expense. In saying this, there are a few facilities around that do have accommodation options available that are suited to a family. In most cases, however, we find that if you are travelling with a family or animal, travelling in a caravan/campervan is a great way to compromise. If the hospital/clinic you are contracted to have the facilities for you to park your van onsite, they will generally offer this. Otherwise, caravan parks are readily available in most towns and are a cheaper alternative than booking a family-sized hotel room.

Agency work is sporadic in nature and when working with a nursing agency such as CQ Nurse, flexibility is key. The more wide-spread your location search, and the more open you are to differing contract timeframes, the more options we will be able to give to you. However, while we often have more jobs to fill than we do nurses, we cannot always guarantee work. We recommend signing up to a ‘casual’ pool back home, to ensure that you have the option of working and having finances coming in during a time that you wish to be or need to be at home or during any quiet periods.

CQ Nurse recognizes that rural and remote nursing has daily challenges unlike any others, and understands that your first few contracts as an agency nurse can be quite daunting. Because of this, we pride ourselves on the support that we offer to our nurses. We will check in with you regularly whilst you are on contract to ensure that all is going well, and we are always available on the other end of the phone if you have any issues on contract, have missed your flight, are feeling a bit homesick or if you just want to chat! Your safety is of the upmost importance, and so we also have an emergency phone that is operational outside of our office hours for any emergency situations that may occur and have a consultant on call to assist at all times.

In the majority of cases, facilities will offer accommodation as an inclusive aspect of your contract, whether that be in the form of nurses’ quarters, a unit or house that is rented by the facility, or a share house. This accommodation is usually provided at no cost to you, however there are a small number of facilities who offer accommodation at a subsidised cost or require a weekly rental fee. We will always let you know what the accommodation provisions of each contract are.

Like accommodation, travel assistance is offered in the majority of cases, however the level of assistance will vary between facilities and contracts. CQ Nurse has an in-house travel consultant who will liaise with you regarding the best travel options for getting you safely to and from your contract location, make all travel bookings on your behalf, and send you a pre-organised travel itinerary.