During an assessment under our new approach
Date of assessment: 22 to 25 July 2025. Qualified Care Ltd is a domiciliary care agency providing personal care and support to people in their own homes. At the time of our inspection the service was providing personal care to 3 people. This was the first inspection of the service which was registered with CQC in December 2021.
We found significant shortfalls in the standard of care being delivered. The provider told us they did not have time to adequately monitor how the service was operating, and as a result had not identified that people were being exposed to a significant risk of harm. Where people had health conditions there was no or very little information for staff on how to support people with these, and where incidents of harm occurred the service was not taking any learning to prevent them from happening again. Staff were working extremely long periods of up to 20 hours a day for up to 10 days in a row without a break, putting both themselves and people they supported at risk of harm. People’s care needs had not been thoroughly assessed to ensure the service was able to safely support people, and staff were not trained in the needs of people they supported. Recruitment processes did not ensure staff were competent and safe to work with vulnerable people. There were large gaps in records where people had received care, but no information was documented or was only completed a significant amount of time later. The provider had no mechanisms to understand what care what being delivered. lacked knowledge about how the service was operating, and did not know the health and care needs of the people they supported.
The service was in breach of 6 legal requirements in relation to person centred care, safe care and treatment, safeguarding service users from abuse and improper treatment, good governance, staffing and failure to submit notifications of incidents.
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 use 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.