This was Raeburn Group Limited Swindon’s first inspection since registering in November 2017. This is the first time the service has been rated requires improvement. We carried out this announced visit on 27 September 2018.

This service is a domiciliary care agency. It provides personal care to people living in their own homes in the community. It currently provides a service to older adults. At the time of our inspection 13 people were receiving personal care in their home and their care was paid for through either the council or people were paying for their own care.

There were various audits and monitoring checks in place. There were some systems in place to ensure people safely received their medicines. However, due to recording errors and a lack of effective medicine administration record audits, we could not be confident that people always received their medicines correctly. Audits had not always been recorded and did not always effectively identify where improvements needed to be made.

This was a breach of The Health and Social Care Act 2008 (Regulated Activities) Regulations 2014. You can see what action we told the provider to take at the back of the full version of the report.

There were two registered managers in post. 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.

We received mixed feedback on the service from people using the service and their relatives. Several people and their relatives told us there were issues with punctuality and changes all the time with the care workers.

We did receive positive feedback, with everyone telling us, the care workers were lovely, kind and caring.

Care workers also gave us varied feedback. The main issues were a lack of communication between the staff in the office and the care workers. They also commented on the changes frequently with the rota and a lack of support from the office staff and management.

However, two care workers highlighted more positive areas of the service, telling us the service was fair and helpful and that the hours suited them and they were happy working for the service.

The registered manager was aware of the improvements that needed to be made for people using the service and for the care workers and was trying to address the issues by regularly recruiting new care workers so that a consistent service could be offered to people. They also planned to offer more team meetings and supervisions to care workers so they had the chance to voice their concerns and issues.

People's needs and potential risks were assessed and the support people needed was recorded and reviewed. Improvements needed to be made to ensure all information in people's care records was accurate and up to date. People's health and nutritional needs were assessed and they were supported with these areas of their lives if this was required.

People and their relatives told us they did not feel their complaints were always acted on and addressed. There were systems in place to manage and respond to complaints but these needed to ensure they fully resolved the concerns people had raised to the provider.

People were supported to have maximum choice and control of their lives and staff supported them in the least restrictive way possible. The systems in the service supported this practice.

There were sufficient numbers of care workers employed to meet people's needs. Recruitment checks were in place to obtain information about new staff before they were allowed to support people. Improvements to the information obtained needed to be made.

The provider had arrangements to help protect people from the risk of the spread of infection as the care workers wore protective equipment, such as glove