Care Inspectorate notifications: what adult care services must report, and when

Notifications are how the Care Inspectorate finds out about important events between inspections. It uses them to judge risk, decide when to inspect and check you've taken the right action. At inspection, inspectors compare what you notified with your accident and incident records, so the two need to match.

This guide covers adult care services in Scotland, including care homes, care homes with nursing and care at home. Services for children and early learning and childcare have their own guidance.

Where the duty comes from

• Law: under the Public Services Reform (Scotland) Act 2010 and regulation 4 of the Social Care and Social Work Improvement Scotland (Registration) Regulations 2011, the Care Inspectorate tells each provider what it must notify and may vary that from time to time. Some duties are written straight into the Requirements for Care Services Regulations 2011, for example regulation 8: a provider must immediately notify the Care Inspectorate if a manager is convicted of any criminal offence.
• Guidance that sets the detail: Adult care services: Guidance on records you must keep and notifications you must make (March 2025). The Care Inspectorate says failing to notify within the required timescales means you are in breach of your conditions of registration.

How to notify

Notifications go through eForms. A few changes are made through the digital portal instead, such as a change of manager or a significant change in staffing. When you complete a notification, refer to people using the service and staff by their initials only, unless the guidance for that notification asks for more (protection concerns do). Most notifications have an update option: use it to add the outcome of an investigation or a hospital admission rather than sending a new one.

The quick reference

The guidance also covers unfitness of the provider, the appointment of liquidators, and changes to registration details and conditions.

Deaths

Notify all deaths within 24 hours. For a care home, that includes residents who were present when they died and residents who died elsewhere, for example in hospital. For other services, notify if the death happened or was identified while the service was being provided. Record the date, time, cause of death and the name of the certifying doctor.

Protection concerns

Notify any protection concern within 24 hours, including where you've made a protection referral. This notification includes the person's full name, home address and date of birth, the action taken to keep people safe and the referrals made. Send an update within one month. Notifying the Care Inspectorate doesn't replace the referral to the lead agency: do both.

If the concern involves a member of staff, also submit an allegation of misconduct and consider referrals to the SSSC, the NMC and Disclosure Scotland.

Accidents, incidents and injuries

Notify serious adverse events within 24 hours, including any injury needing medical advice or attention, pressure ulcers graded 2 and above (care homes with nursing staff only), altercations between people, any physical intervention or restraint, incidents reportable under RIDDOR, and a person leaving the premises or being unaccounted for. Choose the eForm that fits:

• Incident: an event or near miss that caused, or could have caused, injury or ill health. If unsure, use this one.
• Accident: an unintended, unexpected event resulting in an injury that needs medical advice or attention.
• Injury: an injury not linked to a known incident or accident.

If you've made a protection referral about the event, use the protection concern notification instead, with the details included. Where you don't have all the information within 24 hours, send what you have and update it later.

Outbreaks

Notify outbreaks within 24 hours, including influenza, C. difficile, norovirus, scabies, E. coli, legionella, chickenpox or shingles, whooping cough, mumps, measles and slapped cheek syndrome. Include when you notified Public Health Scotland and the advice you were given. Suspected Covid-19 cases no longer need notifying; confirmed outbreaks do.

Staffing, management and misconduct

• Allegation of misconduct: within 24 hours, without personal details at first. Include referrals made and, if the person wasn't suspended, why not and what safeguards are in place. If you permanently remove someone from a regulated role because of harmful behaviour, you have a legal duty to refer them to Disclosure Scotland. The guidance warns that if the referral isn't made within three months, Disclosure Scotland will report the organisation to Police Scotland.
• Manager absence: 28 days or more needs a notification at least 14 days before, or within one week in an emergency, with the management arrangements in the meantime.
• Staff vacancies and absences: only significant ones that affect, or could affect, people's outcomes now need notifying. Keep a record of all absences and the cover arranged either way. Our Staffing Act guide explains the duty behind this.

Related duties

• Adult protection referrals to the local authority are separate and still needed.
• Duty of candour: Scotland's statutory duty of candour is in Part 2 of the Health (Tobacco, Nicotine etc. and Care) (Scotland) Act 2016. The Care Inspectorate looks for it in notifications about unexpected or preventable harm.
• RIDDOR: some injuries and incidents must also be reported to HSE. That's a separate report.
• England is different: CQC notifications follow different rules. See CQC statutory notifications.

A simple process for every incident

1. Make people safe and get medical help.
2. Record it the same day: what happened, who was involved (initials or room number), witnesses, immediate action.
3. Ask: is this a death, protection concern, serious adverse event, outbreak, medication error, misconduct or equipment failure?
4. If yes, submit the eForm within 24 hours and note the date sent.
5. Make any protection referral and consider duty of candour.
6. Update the notification with the outcome, and record lessons learned.

How ShiftComplete helps

ShiftComplete doesn't submit eForms, and its notification prompt is written for CQC in England, not the Care Inspectorate. What it does give a Scottish service:

• Incidents (falls, injuries, safeguarding concerns and more) recorded on a phone, with the person involved by initials or room number only.
• A "sent on" date field, so you can record when the notification went and show it matches your log.
• Lessons learned against each incident, plus audits with action lists and a full audit trail.

It works alongside your care-records system, costs £2.49 per active staff member per month with no contract, and the first 60 days are free with no card needed. Our Care Inspectorate inspection checklist covers the rest of the evidence.

See it set up for a Scottish home on our care homes page.