The part of an inspection that managers worry about most is the part they cannot control: an inspector sitting down with a care worker in the dining room and asking questions. You can tidy a file. You cannot script a team, and you should not try.
What you can do is make sure your staff have heard the questions before, understand why they are being asked, and know that the honest answer is nearly always the right one. This guide lists the questions inspectors actually ask, grouped under the five key questions, with what a weak answer sounds like and what a strong one sounds like. It is written from the experience of running learning-disability, mental-health, nursing and residential services, and from sitting in on a lot of these conversations.
The short answer
Inspectors ask staff four kinds of question: what would you do if (a scenario), tell me about this person (knowledge of individuals), show me where that is recorded (evidence), and what is it like working here (culture). They are not testing memory of policy titles. They are testing whether the way the service says it works is the way it actually works. The strongest answers are specific, name a real person or a real event, describe what the worker did rather than what the policy says, and end with what happened next. The weakest answers are policy recitals, I would tell the manager with nothing after it, and we have never had that happen here.
Why inspectors talk to staff at all
Under the single assessment framework, inspectors gather evidence in categories: people's experience, feedback from staff and leaders, feedback from partners, observation, and processes. Staff feedback is one of those categories in its own right, and it is also the fastest way to test whether the processes category is real.
Records can be written to look good. A care worker describing what she did when a resident fell at three in the morning cannot be. That is why a conversation of five minutes with a worker often carries more weight than an hour with a folder.
Who gets asked
Everybody. In a typical two-day inspection of a medium home, inspectors will speak to care workers on both shifts, a nurse or senior if you have them, the chef or kitchen assistant, a housekeeper, the activities coordinator, the maintenance person if they can find them, agency or bank staff if any are on, the deputy and the registered manager. They will also try to speak to night staff, either at the end of a night shift or by arriving early.
Ancillary staff are frequently the most revealing, because they are least prepared and most honest. A housekeeper who says she would report a bruise she saw while changing a bed tells the inspector more about your safeguarding culture than any training matrix.
How the conversation actually goes
It is usually informal. An inspector will introduce themselves, say the conversation is confidential, and start with something easy such as how long have you worked here. They will move to knowledge of individuals, then to scenarios, then to culture. They will often circle back to something the worker said earlier.
They are listening for consistency across people. If four workers describe the same approach to a resident, that is a strong signal. If four workers describe four different approaches, the care plan is not being used, whatever it says.
The warm-up questions
- How long have you worked here, and what did you do before?
- What is your role on a typical shift?
- Can you describe your induction when you started?
- How many people do you support on a shift?
- Do you work with the same people most days?
- What do you enjoy about working here?
- What one thing would you change if you could?
None of these are innocent. Induction, continuity and that last question are all evidence. The last one is where a worker who has raised the same issue three times without a response will say so.
Safe: safeguarding questions
- What does safeguarding mean to you?
- What are the signs that someone might be being abused or neglected?
- What would you do if you saw a colleague being rough with a resident?
- What would you do if a resident told you their son was taking money from them?
- Who would you report to if the manager was not available, or if your concern was about the manager?
- Have you ever raised a safeguarding concern here? What happened?
- Can you tell me about the local authority safeguarding team, and how a referral gets made?
- Would you know how to contact CQC yourself?
- What is whistleblowing, and would you feel able to do it?
What a good safeguarding answer sounds like
Weak: safeguarding means keeping people safe, and I would report it to my manager.
Strong: safeguarding means protecting people from abuse and neglect, and it covers physical, financial, emotional, sexual, discriminatory, organisational, neglect, self-neglect, domestic abuse and modern slavery. If I saw a colleague being rough I would stop it there and then, make sure the resident was all right, and report it to the senior on shift straight away. I would write what I saw in my own words the same shift. If it was about the manager I would go to the provider or straight to the local authority safeguarding team, and I know I can also contact CQC. I raised a concern in the spring about a resident whose money was not adding up and it went to a safeguarding referral, and the manager told me afterwards what came of it. Our safeguarding guide sets out the categories and the referral route in full.
Safe: medicines questions
- Are you trained to give medicines? When were you last assessed as competent?
- Talk me through your medicines round.
- What do you do if a resident refuses their tablets?
- What is a PRN medicine, and how do you decide when to give one?
- How do you know a PRN worked?
- What would you do if you realised you had given the wrong tablet?
- What happens to medicines that are handwritten on the MAR chart?
- Who checks the controlled drugs, and how often?
- What is covert medication, and has anyone here got it in place?
- What do you do if a medicine is out of stock?
Strong answers here are procedural and calm. On errors, the answer inspectors want is: I would tell the senior immediately, we would check the resident and ring 111 or the GP for advice, I would complete an incident form, and the manager would look at why it happened. A worker who hesitates before saying they would report their own error is telling the inspector something about your culture, not about the worker.
Safe: risk, falls and accidents
- Which residents are at risk of falls, and what do you do differently for them?
- What would you do if you found someone on the floor?
- When would you not move them?
- What is a body map and when do you complete one?
- Who is at risk of choking here, and what consistency do they have?
- What is a pressure ulcer and how do you prevent one?
- How often is this person repositioned, and where is that recorded?
- What is on this person's risk assessment for going out alone?
- Tell me about the last accident you dealt with. What happened afterwards?
The last question is the important one. An inspector is checking whether incidents lead to change. Our article on incident reporting covers the loop that answer should describe.
Safe: infection prevention and the environment
- Where are your gloves and aprons kept, and when do you change them?
- What would you do if a resident had diarrhoea and vomiting?
- Who cleans equipment such as hoist slings and commodes, and how often?
- Does each resident have their own sling?
- What would you do if you noticed the water was scalding hot in a bathroom?
- Where is the fire evacuation plan for this person, and what does it say?
- What would you do right now if the fire alarm went off?
Safe: staffing
- Are there enough staff on a typical shift?
- What happens when someone calls in sick?
- How often do you use agency, and do agency workers know the residents?
- Are you ever working alone with people you do not know?
- Do you get your breaks?
- Is there a nurse or senior on at night?
Staff often think loyalty means saying staffing is fine when it is not. Tell your team the truth in advance: a service that says staffing is tight on Sundays and shows what it is doing about it looks far better than one where six workers say everything is fine and the inspector watches two people manage a lunch for twenty.
Effective: consent and mental capacity
- How do you ask for consent before you support someone?
- What would you do if a resident refused personal care?
- What does mental capacity mean?
- Is capacity the same for every decision?
- Who can make a decision for someone who lacks capacity?
- What is a best interests decision, and have you been involved in one?
- What is a DoLS authorisation? Does anyone here have one, and what conditions are attached?
- Is anyone here subject to restrictions, and who agreed them?
- What is a lasting power of attorney, and how would you know if a relative had one?
What a good capacity answer sounds like
Weak: she has dementia so she does not have capacity.
Strong: capacity is decision-specific and time-specific. Jean can choose what she wears and what she eats, and she can tell me clearly when she does not want a shower. She cannot weigh up decisions about her finances, so her son has a registered lasting power of attorney for property and affairs and there is a best interests record for the decision about her hospital appointment. She has a DoLS authorisation with a condition about supported walks outside twice a week, and we record those. Our Mental Capacity Act and DoLS checklist sets out the five principles staff should be able to describe.
Effective: training, induction and supervision
- What training have you had in the last year?
- Did you complete the Care Certificate, and how long did it take?
- Was your induction shadow shifts or paperwork?
- What training did you have for this person's specific needs, such as epilepsy, diabetes, PEG feeding or autism?
- When was your last supervision, and what did you talk about?
- When was your last appraisal?
- How do you find out about changes to a person's care?
- Would you feel confident supporting someone whose behaviour becomes distressed? What training have you had for that?
Condition-specific training is where homes get caught. Generic mandatory training is checked on the matrix; what an inspector asks the worker is whether they were trained in the thing that person actually has. Our mandatory training guide covers the split.
Effective: nutrition, hydration and health
- Who needs help with eating, and what help do they need?
- What is a MUST score, and who is at risk of malnutrition here?
- How do you know if someone has not been drinking enough?
- What happens to the fluid charts at the end of the day?
- Who has a modified diet, and what level is it?
- What would you do if you noticed someone had lost weight?
- When did this person last see a GP, dentist or optician?
Effective: working with other services
- What happens when a resident goes into hospital?
- What is a hospital passport, and who updates it?
- How do you get a district nurse or a GP out?
- What happens when a person comes back from hospital with changed medicines?
- Have you ever felt that a health professional did not listen? What did you do?
Caring: dignity and privacy
- How do you protect someone's dignity during personal care?
- What do you call the residents, and how do you know what they prefer?
- How do you make sure conversations about people are private?
- What would you do if a resident wanted to lock their bedroom door?
- How do you support someone who wants time alone?
- How do you support relationships, including intimate relationships?
- What would you do if a resident wanted to have a drink or smoke?
Caring: knowing the person
This is the question set that separates services. Inspectors pick two or three people and ask staff about them by name.
- Tell me about Marcus. What matters to him?
- What did he do before he came here?
- What makes him anxious, and how do you know when he is?
- How does he tell you he is in pain?
- What is his morning routine, and who decided it?
- Who is important to him, and when did they last visit?
- What is he working towards?
- What would you do differently if you had more time with him?
Weak: he is quite independent, he likes the telly. Strong: Marcus is 41, he worked in a warehouse before he became unwell, and he is working towards his own flat. He stops answering his phone two or three days before he becomes unwell, which is his main early warning sign and it is written in his plan in his own words. He manages his own medication with a weekly check, which we agreed as a positive risk. He hates being asked how he is feeling more than once a day, so we check in differently.
Caring: involving people and families
- How is this person involved in their own care plan?
- Has the person seen their care plan, and is there a version they can understand?
- How do you involve families, and how often do you contact them?
- What would you do if a family member disagreed with what the person wanted?
- Is there a residents meeting or a family meeting, and does anything change as a result?
Responsive: personalised care and communication
- How do you know how this person likes to be supported?
- How do you communicate with someone who does not use speech?
- What is a communication passport, and where is it kept?
- Does anyone here need information in easy read or large print, and do they get it?
- How do you support someone whose first language is not English?
- How do you meet someone's cultural or religious needs?
- What activities happen at weekends and in the evenings?
- What does this person do that they actually chose?
Responsive: complaints and end of life
- What would you do if a resident or a relative complained to you?
- Do you know what happened to the last complaint?
- How would a resident complain if they could not write or speak?
- Is anyone here at the end of their life, and what are their wishes?
- What is a ReSPECT form or a DNACPR, and where is it kept?
- Would you know what to do if someone died on your shift?
- How are staff supported after a death?
Well-led: culture and management
- Who is your manager, and when did you last see them on the floor?
- Can you go to the manager with a problem? Give me an example.
- Do you have team meetings, and does anything change as a result?
- How do you find out about changes in the home?
- Do you feel listened to?
- What happens when somebody makes a mistake here?
- Have you ever been asked for your opinion about how the home is run?
- Is there anything you have raised that has not been dealt with?
What a good culture answer sounds like
Weak: yes, she is lovely.
Strong: the manager does a walk round every morning and works the floor when we are short. In September I said the evening medicine round was clashing with tea, so we moved the round to seven and it works better. We have team meetings monthly and the notes get put in the office for anyone on nights. When someone makes a mistake it is written up and discussed, and I have never seen anyone punished for reporting one, which is why people do report them.
Well-led: raising concerns and duty of candour
- What is whistleblowing, and who would you contact outside the home?
- Have you ever felt unable to raise something? Why?
- What is duty of candour?
- If a resident was harmed, would the family be told? Who tells them?
- Do you know what the home's last inspection rating was, and what the action plan says?
The last one catches services out. Staff should know the rating and the two or three things the service is working on. Our guide to whistleblowing covers the external routes staff should be able to name.
Questions for agency and bank staff
- Have you worked here before?
- What induction did you get today?
- Were you shown the care plans, or told about the residents verbally?
- Do you know who is at risk of choking or falls on this unit?
- Do you know where the fire exits and the evacuation plans are?
- Who would you report a concern to today?
An agency worker who says nobody showed me anything, I just got a handover sheet is one of the most damaging five seconds in an inspection, and it is entirely preventable with a signed short induction and read-only access to the plans for the people they are supporting. Our article on agency staff covers the induction pack.
Questions for the chef, housekeeper and maintenance
- How do you know who has a modified diet or an allergy?
- What is the IDDSI level for this person, and how do you check the consistency?
- Who tells you when someone's diet changes?
- How do you know a resident's food preferences and cultural requirements?
- What would you do if you saw a bruise while changing a bed?
- How do you know which room needs deep cleaning after an infection?
- How are repairs reported, and how quickly are they done?
- Do you have access to the maintenance log for hot water temperatures and window restrictors?
Questions about a person the inspector has chosen
Inspectors usually pick two or three people early and follow them through the whole inspection. They will ask several different staff about the same person, then read that person's records, then speak to the person and their family. This is called pathway tracking and it is the sharpest tool they have.
| What the inspector asks | Who they ask | What they are checking |
|---|---|---|
| What does Priya need help with at mealtimes? | Care worker, then the chef | Whether the dysphagia plan has travelled to the kitchen |
| How does Priya show she is in pain? | Two workers separately, then the nurse | Whether staff know her non-verbal signs consistently |
| When did Priya last see the GP and why? | Senior, then the record | Whether health needs are followed up and recorded |
| What did you do about her weight loss? | Manager | Whether monitoring leads to action |
| Tell me about her family contact | Care worker, then family by phone | Whether the relationship described matches the family's experience |
| Show me where her repositioning is recorded | Care worker on the floor | Whether staff can find records quickly during a shift |
The three answers that cost you most
| Answer | What the inspector hears | What to say instead |
|---|---|---|
| I would just tell my manager | The worker has no independent understanding of their own duty | What you would do first to keep the person safe, who you would tell, what you would write, and who you would go to if the manager was unavailable |
| It is in the policy, I would look it up | Training has not translated into practice | The answer in your own words, then where it is written down if you need to check the detail |
| That has never happened here | Either the service does not recognise incidents, or the worker is closing the conversation | What you would do, and if it genuinely has not happened, the nearest real thing that has |
What to do when a worker does not know
Teach your team this sentence: I am not sure, but I would find out by asking the senior or looking in the care plan, and I would do it before I supported them.
That is a perfectly good answer. Inspectors are far more comfortable with a worker who knows the limits of their knowledge and knows where to look than with one who guesses confidently. What damages you is invention.
Preparing your team without scripting them
Scripting is obvious and it backfires, because inspectors ask follow-up questions and a scripted worker cannot answer the second one. What works is exposure and honesty.
- Use ten minutes of every team meeting for three of these questions, answered out loud by different people.
- Put one question in every supervision, based on a real resident.
- Do a walk round yourself and ask staff about a person by name, the way an inspector would.
- Tell your team that saying we are short on Sundays is allowed, and that saying what the home is doing about it matters more.
- Make sure every worker knows the current rating and the top three improvement priorities.
- Make sure agency and ancillary staff are included, because they will be asked.
Our guides to preparing for a CQC inspection and inspection day hour by hour cover the rest of the preparation, including what to have ready in the first thirty minutes.
What the manager gets asked
- Tell me about your service and what you are proud of.
- What are your three biggest risks right now?
- How do you know the care here is good, other than because you see it?
- Show me your audits for the last six months, and what changed as a result.
- How do you learn from incidents and complaints?
- How do you know staff are competent, not just trained?
- What is your dependency tool, and how do you set staffing levels?
- How do you support staff wellbeing and retention?
- What have you reported to us this year, and what came of it?
The strongest managers answer the third question with numbers and examples rather than adjectives, and they volunteer a weakness before being asked. Knowing your own problems, with a dated plan against each, is the clearest evidence of being well-led there is.
Making the evidence easy to reach
Several of these questions end with show me. Staff should be able to find a repositioning chart, a fluid chart, a behaviour record or a body map in under a minute, on the floor, without going to the office. If your records are in three folders in two rooms, the answer will be slow, and slow looks like doubt.
This is one of the practical arguments for keeping care records, daily logs, medication and incidents in a single place that staff can open on a handset. Kiwi was built for that, but the point stands whatever you use: rehearse finding things, not just writing them.
Final conclusion
Inspectors are not trying to catch your staff out. They are trying to work out whether the service on paper is the service people actually get. The way to prepare is not a script and not a rehearsal week. It is a habit: ask your own team these questions all year, listen to the answers, and fix what the answers reveal.
If a housekeeper knows to report a bruise, an agency worker can name who is at risk of choking, a care worker can describe what Marcus is working towards, and a nurse can say what changed after the last medicine error, your inspection will look after itself. If you want to see how records that staff can reach in a minute change those conversations, book a short demo, but the work is in the asking.
Frequently asked
What questions do CQC ask care staff?
Mostly four kinds: scenario questions (what would you do if you saw a colleague being rough with a resident), knowledge questions about named individuals (tell me about Marcus and what matters to him), evidence questions (show me where repositioning is recorded), and culture questions (what happens when somebody makes a mistake here). They are grouped around the five key questions of safe, effective, caring, responsive and well-led.
Does CQC speak to every member of staff?
Not every one, but far more than managers expect. In a typical inspection they speak with care workers on both day and night shifts, a nurse or senior, the chef, a housekeeper, maintenance, activities, any agency staff on duty, the deputy and the registered manager. Ancillary staff are often asked safeguarding questions because their answers reveal the real culture.
What is the best answer to a safeguarding question?
One that starts with what you would do to make the person safe, names who you would tell and when, says what you would write down, and names an alternative route if the manager is not available or the concern is about them. Adding a real example of a concern you raised and what came of it is stronger than any definition.
Should staff admit if the home is short-staffed?
Yes. Honesty from staff combined with a manager who can show what is being done about it reads far better than several workers insisting everything is fine while the inspector watches two people run a lunch service. Inspectors verify against observation and rotas, so a false picture does not survive.
What if a care worker does not know the answer?
Saying I am not sure, but I would check the care plan or ask the senior before supporting them is a good answer. Inspectors are comfortable with a worker who knows the limits of their knowledge. Guessing or inventing an answer is what causes harm.
What do CQC ask agency staff?
Whether they have worked there before, what induction they received that day, whether they were shown care plans, who is at risk of falls or choking, where the fire exits and evacuation plans are, and who they would report a concern to. A signed short induction and read-only access to the plans for the people they are supporting answers all of it.
Should we script staff answers before an inspection?
No. Scripts collapse at the first follow-up question and inspectors recognise them immediately. Use the questions in supervision and team meetings through the year so staff have thought about them, and make sure everyone knows the current rating and the service's top improvement priorities.
What questions does the registered manager get asked?
What you are proud of, your three biggest current risks, how you know the care is good beyond your own observation, your audits and what changed as a result, how you learn from incidents and complaints, how you assure competence rather than training completion, how staffing levels are set, and what you have notified to CQC this year. Volunteering a weakness with a dated plan against it is strong evidence of being well-led.
Sources
- Care Quality Commission: single assessment framework and quality statements
- Care Quality Commission: evidence categories, including feedback from staff and leaders
- Health and Social Care Act 2008 (Regulated Activities) Regulations 2014
- Mental Capacity Act 2005 and the Deprivation of Liberty Safeguards
- Care Act 2014 and statutory safeguarding guidance
- Skills for Care: Care Certificate standards
- NICE guideline SC1: Managing medicines in care homes
- Care Quality Commission: Right support, right care, right culture
