I am a registered manager of a domiciliary private social care company. I manage caregivers who attend to vulnerable adults to support them with daily activities. I have recently completed a PIR information request for CQC and awaiting an inspection. How do I get ready and what should I prepare to be checked?

Answered by Sheila Scott

Dear R,

Thank you for your question.

If and when your inspection happens everyone and everything needs to be prepared for it. This will make the inspection easier for you and for the inspectors.

Having completed your PIR, you should have a good idea of how up to date your paperwork is.

CQC will hope to speak to members of your staff and one or two service users or their relatives, but the majority of their time will be spent in your office talking to you and looking at your paperwork.

Are your policies and procedures current and have you reviewed them in the last year?

Are your staff records complete including DBS information and the appropriate references?

Are the care plans complete with all the required information and are they regularly reviewed?

Are your risk assessments comprehensive and up to date?

That is the sort of thing that you would expect CQC to be interested in.

If I were an inspector, I would also want to gain from talking to you some insight in to your vision for the delivery of your service and any steps you are taking to improve the quality of the service.

So be prepared, reflect on your service and tell the inspector about any innovations you have either implemented or are considering no matter how minor.

There are any number of things that you have done that the inspectors will never know about unless you tell them.

Finally look on CQC’s website at other provider’s reports of the inspection of their service.

This will also give you a good idea of what could happen on the day.

I hope this is helpful.

Best wishes.

Sheila