Last updated 10 January 2019
We carried out this inspection under Section 60 of the Health and Social Care Act 2008 as part of our regulatory functions. This inspection was planned to check whether the provider is meeting the legal requirements and regulations associated with the Health and Social Care Act 2008, to look at the overall quality of the service, and to provide a rating for the service under the Care Act 2014.

We gave the service 48 hours’ notice of the inspection visit because it is small and the manager is often out of the office supporting staff or providing care. We needed to be sure that they would be in.

The inspection site visit started on 29 October 2018 and ended on 7 November 2018. We visited the office location on 29 October and 2 November 2018 to see the registered manager and office staff; and to review care records and policies and procedures.

This inspection was conducted by an adult social care inspector.

Prior to the inspection we reviewed information we held about the service. This included notifications the provider is obliged to send to us and we used information the provider sent us in the Provider Information Return. This is information we require providers to send us at least once annually to give some key information about the service, what the service does well and improvements they plan to make

We reviewed a range of documents related to people’s care and the management of the service, including five people’s care plans, care notes, quality audits, meeting minutes and six staff personnel files.

We spoke with six people who use the service by telephone and conducted a visit to one person’s home. We spoke with seven staff, including the registered manager, deputy manager, senior care staff and care staff. We also spoke with one healthcare professional who worked closely with the service and a representative from a local charity which also worked with the service.