PCAS Kent Ltd

Ratings

• Overall

  Inadequate

• Safe

  Inadequate

• Effective

  Requires improvement

• Caring

  Requires improvement

• Responsive

  Requires improvement

• Well-led

  Inadequate

Our view of the service

We completed an assessment between 24 March 2025 and 07 April 2025. PCAS is a supported living service. A supported living service provides individuals with personal care and support to enable them to live as independently as possible in their own homes or shared accommodation. We assessed the service against ‘Right support, right care, right culture’ guidance to make judgements about whether the provider guaranteed people with a learning disability and autistic people respect, equality, dignity, choices, independence and good access to local communities that most people take for granted. The service was not meeting the guidance of RSRCRC: this had a detrimental impact on people’s lives.

At this assessment the provider failed to ensure people’s health risks were well managed, or that people were supported by suitably qualified and competent staff. Medicines had not been managed safely. People were not treated with dignity, kindness and respect. There was a lack of effective oversight of the service to identify and make improvements. Audits and checks that were completed had not identified the serious and widespread issues within this assessment.

We found significant shortfalls across the service and identified breaches of 6 regulations in relation to providing people with person centred care, safeguarding, safe care and treatment, need for consent, staffing and good governance.

This service is being placed in special measures. The purpose of special measures is to ensure that services providing inadequate care make significant improvements. Special measures provide a framework within which we user our enforcement powers in response to inadequate care and provide a timeframe within which providers must improve the quality of the care they provide. In instances where CQC have decided to take civil or criminal enforcement action against a provider, we will publish this information on our website after any representations and/or appeals have been concluded.

At the previous assessment, the provider was in breach of regulations relating to safe recruitment. The provider was no longer in breach of this regulation at this assessment.

People's experience of this service

While people expressed general satisfaction with their care, our assessment found elements of care did not meet the expected standards. For example, people’s health and wellbeing risks were not being well managed.