CQC Prosecutions of Unregistered Businesses

CQC requires any person and any business that provides regulated activities (personal care, certain health services) to be registered with the Care Quality Commission (CQC). Those who are not so registered are liable to prosecution.

Care Home Defence Service can advise and represent those individuals who are prosecuted for unregistered activity (in care homes, domiciliary care agencies, clinics, hospitals), where CQC brings a criminal prosecution or seeks to impose a fixed penalty.

CQC, The Decision to Prosecute

The CQC can prosecute when they have prima facie evidence that an offence has been committed and they can identify those responsible.

CQC will make a decision to prosecute if they can prove that unregistered services have been provided. On occasions CQC will have obtained independent evidence. Otherwise, CQC may rely on admissions made by unregistered care providers.

Fixed Penalty Notices – (CQC Fixed Penalties)

A fixed penalty notice can be imposed by the CQC purusant to s. 86 and s.24 of Part 5 of The Health and Social Care Act 2008 (Regulated Activities) Regulations 2014., and Schedule 5 of the same regulations. 

Schedule 5 fixed penalty reads as follows:

10. Requirement to register as a service provider

(1) Any person who carries on a regulated activity without being registered under this Chapter in respect of the carrying on of that activity is guilty of an offence.

What is a Regulated Activity?

CQC hold that the following activities are regulated activities that require registration with CQC to be able to perform them:

• Personal Care
• Accommodation for People who require nursing or personal care
• Accommodation for people who require treatment for substance misuse
• Treatment for disease, disorder or injury
• Assessment or medical treatment for persons detained under the Mental Health Act 1983
• Surgical Procedures
• Diagnostic and screening procedures
• Management of supply of blood and blood-derived products
• Transport services, triage and medical advice provided remotely
• Maternity and midwifery services
• Termination of pregnancies
• Services in slimming clinics
• Nursing care
• Family planning services

Example Fixed Penalty Cases

Some examples of CQC imposing fixed penalties on unregistered care providers can be found here:

2019

Two Businesses Each Fined £4000 Fixed for Providing Unregistered Personal Care Services (September 2019)

Magistrates Court Prosecutions by CQC

In some instances, offences will be prosecutued in the magistrates court, as an alternative. This may be where the defendants decline to pay the fixed penalty, or CQC lay (file) an information at the court as an alternative to issuing a fixed penalty notice. See for example:

Two Individuals (Company Director and Manager) Fined (£660 and £1,100 respectively, with each paying £4000 in costs each, so totalling £4660 and £5,100) for Providing Personal Care Services for 14 months while unregistered. (June 2019) It is not clear from this case whether or not a fixed penalty was offered. The case demonstrates, all the same, that if a fixed penalty is available, it might be more costly to go to a court if one is going to enter a plea of guilty, especially when one takes into account that the above figures do not include any defence legal costs.

CRIMINAL CASE REPRESENTATION

Care Home Defence Service represents care homes and other care establishments in criminal prosecutions brought by CQC. For advice relating to fixed penalty fines or magistrates prosecutions, give us a call without obligation and in strict confidence, or use our Contact Form.