The inspection took place 08 October 2018 and was announced. This is the first inspection of this service since the provider made changes to their registration in September 2017.

This service is a domiciliary care agency. It provides a service to younger adults and older adults who live with learning disabilities or autistic spectrum disorders to enable them to live in their own homes either on their own or sharing with others in supported living services. A supported living service is one where people receive care and support to enable them to live independently. People have a tenancy agreement with a housing provider and receive their care and support from HF Trust Herts and Essex DCA. CQC does not regulate premises used for supported living; this inspection looked at people’s personal care and support. At the time of our inspection a total of 22 people were receiving support with their personal care.

The service had a registered manager. A registered manager is a person who has registered with the Care Quality Commission to manage the service. Like registered providers, they are ‘registered persons’. Registered persons have legal responsibility for meeting the requirements in the Health and Social Care Act 2008 and associated Regulations about how the service is run.

People, and their relatives, told us they were extremely happy with the staff that provided their care, relatives told us they felt staff went beyond the call of duty. People had a small team of staff who supported them which helped to ensure continuity and enabled people to form bonds with the staff. Examples shared with us included where a person had been very ill and staff had supported them to recover their independent living skills, a staff member had worked tirelessly in their own time to promote an anti-bullying campaign in the local community which had helped a person regain their confidence and further examples where staff used their in-depth knowledge and understanding of people to make their lives better in various ways.

People were offered choices and these were respected which contributed towards people feeling that they had control in their lives. Staff interacted with people in a warm, respectful and dignified way. It was clear that people trusted staff and that they worked in partnership to achieve as much independence as possible. Staff understood the importance of promoting people’s independence and support plans supported this to allow people to live as independently as possible.

People all said they felt safe using the service and their relatives confirmed this. People were comfortable in the presence of staff members and their relatives said they couldn’t praise them highly enough. Staff had been trained in how to safeguard people from avoidable harm and were knowledgeable about the potential risks and signs of abuse. People were supported to take risks to retain their independence and maintain their freedom. Risk assessments had been regularly reviewed and kept up to date.

People, their relatives and staff all told us that there were enough staff available to meet people’s needs. Safe and effective recruitment practices were followed to make sure that all staff were of good character and suitable for the roles they performed at the service. Staff completed a six-month probationary period where the provider checked if they were performing to a suitable standard. People were safely supported to take their medicines as they wished, some people were supported to self-administer their medicines, some people had automated pill dispensers and some people received support from staff members. Staff were knowledgeable about people’s individual needs and could tell us what support would be provided in the event of an emergency situation such as a fire. The management and staff team used incidents as a learning tool to help ensure people’s safety and wellbeing.

The care and support provided was appropriate to meet people's needs. Staff rec