CQC readiness and assurance
Most practices don’t struggle at inspection because they lack policies. They struggle because they can’t prove those policies operate. Attesta finds the gaps, builds the evidence and keeps you ready.
The problem
Against each of the five key questions, inspectors look for evidence from people’s experience, staff and partner feedback, observation, processes and outcomes. A document proves a process exists — not that it runs.
Safe
Are people protected from abuse and avoidable harm?
Effective
Does care achieve good outcomes and follow current evidence?
Caring
Are people treated with kindness, dignity and respect?
Responsive
Are services organised to meet people’s needs?
Well-led
Do leadership and governance assure high-quality care?
The Attesta approach
Practices are usually good at paperwork. Where they fall short is evidencing that the paperwork is followed.
Patient safety alerts
On paper: An alerts policy
Proof: A log of each alert: searches run, action taken, date closed
Significant events
On paper: An incident reporting form
Proof: Completed reviews, with the learning minuted and shared
Complaints
On paper: A complaints procedure
Proof: Response times met, and themes reviewed and acted on
Clinical audit
On paper: An audit plan
Proof: A full cycle: audit, change, re-audit, improvement
Governance
On paper: A meeting schedule
Proof: Minutes where owned actions are followed through and closed
Try it now
Pick one control and answer honestly. It’s the same test the full scorecard applies to fifteen controls across all five key questions.
Skip to the full scorecardHow it works
See your current CQC rating, last inspection date and reports, taken from the official CQC register.
Answer 15 questions. Each asks whether a control operates and could be proven, not just whether it’s written down.
Get your Attesta Readiness Score, a Red, Amber or Green band, a score for each key question and your weakest area.
Download the free logs, checklists and posters your service needs, and start building the evidence today.
Talk your result through with Attesta, or start with a Readiness Diagnostic to find your ten priority gaps.
Step 1 · CQC data
Search the CQC register for your practice’s current rating and last inspection. This step is optional.
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Step 2 · Attesta assessment
Fifteen questions across Safe, Effective, Caring, Responsive and Well-led. For each one, choose the answer that best describes what you could show an inspector today.
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Free · no charge, no card
At inspection the problem is rarely that nothing was done — it’s that nothing was written down. These logs, audits, policies and posters fix that.
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These are starting points, not policies written for your service. Review each one against your own procedures and registered activities, and have a suitably qualified person sign it off before you use it. They are not issued or endorsed by the Care Quality Commission.
The role you were about to hire
Compliance Lead, Clinical Governance Lead, Quality and Compliance Manager, CQC Inspection Lead. Different titles, one job: keep the practice inspection-ready. You can hire a person and hope, or retain the output for a fraction of the salary.
| In-house hire | Attesta fractional lead | |
|---|---|---|
| Cost per year | £50k to £78k loaded (advertised £29k to £65k)1 | £15,000. £1,250 a month, no on-costs, cancel on 30 days |
| First output | 8 to 12 weeks to recruit, then 3 months to learn your practice | Readiness readout in 5 to 7 days |
| When they leave | The system walks out the door with them | The system is yours: templates, registers, method, all installed |
| What the partners see | Verbal updates | A written assurance report, every month |
| Across a PCN | One hire per practice | One retainer, blended across 5 to 8 practices |
An inspector now gives you five working days’ notice. A new hire needs ninety to find their feet. That gap is the risk you are actually paying to close.
1. Live adverts, August 2026 (Indeed UK, Find a Job): Head of Care Quality and Compliance £48,000 to £65,000; QI and Compliance Lead, London GP, £40,000 to £55,000; Compliance Administrator, Leeds GP, £29,350. On-cost range (+25% to 30%) is a planning assumption, not a quote. We sell readiness and assurance, never a guaranteed rating.
Start with the Diagnostic for £2,450, credited in full against the fractional retainer within 30 days. Cancel the retainer on 30 days. Everything we install stays yours.
Written quote within one working day. No call required.
Services and pricing
Every engagement starts from evidence. The Diagnostic fee is credited to a Sprint if you go ahead within 30 days.
£2,450
A full audit of your evidence, RAG-rated, with your ten priority gaps and a readout.
Credited against a Readiness Sprint if you go ahead within 30 days.
Most chosen
£7,500
Done for you: we build and package the evidence, fix the policies and rehearse your team.
Replaces the hire
£1,250/month
Two days a month. The compliance hire you budgeted for, as a retained service.
About a quarter of the loaded cost of a hire.
£425/month
Keeps you inspection-ready between inspections.
About £14 a day.
Readiness Scorecard: Free. Start now
Document templates: Free. Browse the library
PCN and white-glove programmes: From £30k (PCN) · £9.5k–£12k (white-glove)
About
Attesta is a Flatlines001 Ltd company. It helps GP practices, dental practices, care homes and other CQC-registered providers get ready for inspection, and stay ready.
An anonymised NHS GP practice.
Learn more
CQC asks the same five questions of every provider. In practice, each one comes down to what you can show:
Under each quality statement, inspectors gather evidence from six sources:
Policies only speak to processes. The other five depend on what actually happens.
CQC rates providers as Outstanding, Good, Requires improvement or Inadequate, overall and for each key question. Ratings and reports are published on the CQC website.
Ratings are set only by CQC. The Attesta Readiness Score is a separate self-assessment, which helps you decide where to focus.
If you can’t answer all three, the control is documented, not operating. Try the self-check.
No. It is Attesta’s own self-assessment, based only on your answers. It isn’t issued or approved by the Care Quality Commission and doesn’t predict your inspection outcome.
About three minutes. There are 15 questions, three for each key question, and you see your result straight away.
Your organisation name and a work email address. We ask for these before showing your CQC results, before showing your readiness score, and before a template download, so we know which providers we’re helping.
Business contact details only. Never enter patient information.
Yes. Every document in the library is free to download and free to use. There is no charge and no card.
We ask for your organisation name and work email so we can see which documents providers actually need, and build the next ones around that.
Yes, and you should. The Word and Excel documents are fully editable: add your logo, change the columns and match the wording to your own policies and registered activities.
They are starting points. Have a suitably qualified person in your organisation review and sign off anything you adopt.
From the Care Quality Commission’s public data, used under the Open Government Licence. We show only what CQC publishes.
No one can. Attesta sells readiness and assurance: finding your evidence gaps, closing them and keeping you ready.
ATTESTA