This is a series of semi-structured interview transcripts collected at two health and social care sector sites in the UK. This qualitative study analyses if and how organisations in three countries (Germany, Finland, and the UK) report similar challenges and how they support longer working careers in the HCS. Therefore, we conducted multiple case studies in care organisations. Altogether 54 semi-structured interviews with employees and representatives of management were carried out and analysed thematically. Only the UK data are uploaded here.Europe is currently undergoing significant demographic change, with an ageing population, shrinking workforce, and increasing life expectancy. In this context, it is necessary to raise the activity rate of older workers in a way that is healthy and productive for workers, employers and countries as a whole. A major issue in extending working lives is that those in different circumstances will be affected differentially by any proposed changes. EXTEND is a cross-national collaborative project which therefore aims to examine inequalities in relation to extending working lives. It addresses inequalities in relation to a number of pertinent issues, including changes to retirement and pension policies, the health and well-being of older workers and retirees, workplace factors, employee skills and training, and regulative and legislative frameworks. The project will take the social services sector as a particularly important example due to the barriers faced by health and care professionals. The evidence base will be generated by drawing on the varied expertise of its partners across five EU countries, employing a range of quantitative and qualitative methods, including policy analysis, panel data methods, natural experiments, a field trial, case studies, interviews and focus groups. We will engage numerous stakeholders with our findings, including policy makers, the business community, workers and their representatives, older people, the general public, and practitioners in the social services sector. The EXTEND project is strongly solution-driven, and has the overall aim of reducing inequalities in retirement structures.

With the aim of seeing whether similar challenges in the HCS are reported across the three sample countries and to explore how age management practices are applied by organisations in this sector, we followed a multiple case study design , with organisations being the unit of analysis. The cases were sampled purposefully. The organisations were recruited using established contacts from previous projects; participants were recruited following a nonprobability sampling strategy through announcements within their organisations. The only inclusion criterion for employees was being involved in care work, which includes professional carers but also care assistants. All interviews were carried out between 2017 and 2018; all of them face-to-face on the premises of the participants’ organisations. The researcher approached all organisations, conducted the interviews and analysed the data. There were no restrictions with respect to the size of the organisation or ownership. An information leaflet about the purpose and structure of the interview was given to potential participants and informed consent was gained. All interviews were audio recorded and transcribed verbatim; anonymity and voluntariness were ensured to participants and organisations. We carried out semi-structured interviews on-site with employees as well as representatives of management. The employees interviewed were care workers/nurses (certified as well as nursing assistants) with different tasks. All of them were or had been involved in care work. A topic guide was developed based on the literature (see section ‘background’) and covered several themes: organisational background and structure; current challenges in the HCS from an organisational perspective, such as potential consequences of prolonging working lives; implemented age management measures including their aims and impact.