About the service Harty Homecare Services Ltd is a domiciliary care agency providing personal care to 10 people at the time of the inspection. The office is based in Caterham, and all the people they support live in the local area.
Not everyone who used the service received personal care. CQC only inspects where people receive personal care. This is help with tasks related to personal hygiene and eating. Where they do we also consider any wider social care provided.
People’s experience of using this service and what we found
People were positive about the experiences using Harty Homecare. They described staff as caring and that they respected their privacy and treated them with respect.
People’s safety was assured because risks to their health were assessed and guidelines were put in place to minimise them coming to harm. Staff understood their roles and responsibilities with regards to keeping people safe from abuse. The registered manger made sure that appropriate checks were carried out on prospective staff to ensure they were safe and suitable to work with people who used Harty Homecare.
There were enough staff to meet the needs of people. The service operated across a small geographical location and people told us their care calls were rarely late, and they had never had a call missed. Staff spent the allotted time with people and made sure their needs were met before they left.
People’s needs were assessed before they used the service. This ensured that these needs were known by staff and that people’s equality and diversity was understood and respected. The service was effective in ensuring people were supported to have enough to eat and drink, and to access health care services should the need arise.
People were supported to have maximum choice and control of their lives and staff supported them in the least restrictive way possible and in their best interests. The policies and systems in the service supported this practice.
Care plans were developed and gave staff guidance on the care and support that people wanted, including action that may need to be taken in emergencies. Complaints about care, when received, were fully investigated and used to make improvements to the service.
People and staff told us they felt the service was well managed, and that the registered manager was approachable, and listened to what they said. Quality assurance processes were used to ensure the service met people’s needs, and that they were happy with their care and support.
For more details, please see the full report which is on the CQC website at www.cqc.org.uk
Rating at last inspection
This service was registered with us on 11 January 2019 and this is the first inspection.
Why we inspected
This was a planned inspection based on the date the service registered with us.
Follow up
We will continue to monitor information we receive about the service until we return to visit as per our re-inspection programme. If we receive any concerning information we may inspect sooner.