Published: 18 February 2024
Firstly, we apologise to providers who have been directly affected by the delays caused by stuck assessments. Recent reports have referred to 500 assessments that were 'stuck'. This covers a range of reports across sectors. We have identified assessments that have not progressed as quickly as we would expect. This has happened for a variety of reasons related to technical factors and our own processes.
Since December we've been exploring the barriers to progressing assessments. This has allowed us to better understand the issues and to refine our definition of what is 'stuck'. We know the time that it takes to publish a report has fallen short of what providers and people who use services should expect.
Our operational teams are working closely with technical teams to progress these reports. In addition, we have recently implemented a system change that has unblocked some assessments and we are exploring other system updates and changes to further improve report timeliness. Our intention is to clear the stuck reports as quickly as possible.
In response to recent media reports about reports being lost in the system, we want to give reassurance that although there have been technical challenges, this will not impact on our duty to report on the outcome of our assessments. We apologise for the delays in report publication, and we continue to prioritise action to ensure we can publish inspection reports more quickly.
CQC has a statutory duty to publish a report following the completion of an assessment. In line with this, delayed reports will still be published. Decisions to re-inspect locations with delayed reports will be made locally on a case by case basis, taking into account individual circumstances.
Communication with affected providers has been managed by local inspection and assessments teams, who have been keeping providers up to date with the progress of their reports.