Two central issues relevant to services delivered to older adults by family members (including extended family) were analyzed: the method used in delivering the services and the geographic proximity required to deliver the service. The analysis involved a study of 1,400 people aged 65 and over and 800 of their helpers. Delivery of services was categorized according to telephone or face-to-face; the frequency of each was measured. Services were categorized as "household" (housekeeping, paying bills, making repairs) and "normal kin" (checking on persons, bringing meals, giving gifts, talking to them when they are depressed). The farther away the helper lived, the smaller the proportion who received household help. By contrast, kinship services were far less affected by geographic distance. Also, in terms of geographic proximity, it appears that when older people were both sick and single, they were more than twice as likely to live in the same household as their helper than those who were married or single and healthy. Also, those classified as poor made more daily face-to-face contacts with their helpers than those with high incomes, attributable to the fact that those in the unskilled labor class, not subject to the problems of occupational mobility, tended to live closer to their relatives. Finally, groups least incorporated into the modern economy (i.e., the poor and recent migrants) were more likely to adhere to a more traditional kinship structure and were least likely to be geographically distant. (KC)