Archived: Heritage Staffing Services

Updated 8 January 2016

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.

The inspection took place on the 14 August 2015 and was unannounced. The inspection team consisted of one inspector.

Before the inspection we checked the information that we held about the service and the provider. This included statutory notifications sent to us by the registered manager about incidents and events that had occurred at the service. A notification is information about important events which the service is required to send us by law. We used all this information to decide which areas to focus on during our inspection.

During our inspection we spoke with four people who use the service over the telephone after our visit to the office. We also spoke with three care staff, the manager and one office based staff. We observed staff working in the office dealing with issues and speaking with people who used the service over the telephone.

We reviewed a range of records about people’s care and how the service was managed. These included the care records for five people, medicine administration record (MAR) sheets, four staff training records, support and employment records, quality assurance audits, incident reports and records relating to the management of the service.

Updated 8 January 2016

The inspection took place on the 14 August 2015 and was unannounced. We later talked to some of the people who use the service and some of their family members over the telephone so that they could tell us about their experiences of using the service.

Heritage Staffing Services started providing care to people in February 2015, it is a small, domiciliary care agency with fewer than twenty people, which provides personal care and support services for a range of people living in their own homes. These included older people, people living with dementia and people with a physical disability.

The service had a manager. A registered manager is a person who has registered with the Care Quality Commission to manage the service. Like registered providers, they are ‘registered persons’. Registered persons have legal responsibility for meeting the requirements in the Health and Social Care Act 2008 and associated Regulations about how the service is run.

The experiences of people were varied. People told us they felt safe, that staff were kind and the care they received was good most of the time, but some people had experienced late and missed visits. This was because the manager bid for and got a contract that increased the number of people they supported. However, an arrangement they made to increase the number of staff did not come to floriation, so for a time the staff were pushed to cover the care visits to the new people.

This situation also meant that the running of the service was disrupted because the manager and the office based staff helped with the care visits leaving the office unstaffed at times and not leaving the manager time to carry out administrative tasks.

We found this was a of breach in the regulations of the Health and Social Care Act 2008 (Regulated Activities) Regulations 2014 and you can see what action we have told the provider to take at the back of the full version of the report.

There were systems and processes in place to keep people safe. Assessments of risk had been undertaken and there were clear instructions for staff on what action to take in order to mitigate them. Staff knew how to recognise the potential signs of abuse and what action to take to keep people safe.

Assessments were undertaken to identify people’s support needs and care plans were developed outlining how these needs were to be met. We found that care plans were detailed which enabled staff to provide the individual care people needed. People told us they were involved in the care plans and were consulted about their care to ensure wishes and preferences were met. Staff worked with other healthcare professionals to obtain specialist advice about people’s care and treatment.

The provider had arrangements in place for the safe administration of medicines. People were supported to receive their medicine when they needed it. People were supported to maintain good health and had assistance to access to health care services when needed.

The service considered peoples’ capacity using the Mental Capacity Act 2005 (MCA) as guidance. Staff observed the key principles in their day to day work checking with people that they were happy for them to undertake care tasks before they proceeded.

People were supported at mealtimes to access food and drink of their choice where needed. The service had good leadership and direction from the manager. Staff felt fully supported by management to undertake their roles. Staff were given training updates, supervision and development opportunities. For example, staff were offered to undertake additional training and development courses to increase their understanding of needs of people using the service.

Feedback was sought by the manager via surveys which were sent to people and their relatives. Survey results were positive and any issues identified acted upon. People and relatives we spoke with were aware of how to make a complaint and felt they would have no problem raising any issues. The provider responded to complaints in a timely manner and kept records of the action taken.