It's 11pm on a Tuesday. The night shift handover at a residential care home in West Yorkshire. Three agency carers arrive to relieve the day staff. One signs the paper register as "Sarah M." Her DBS was checked by the agency six months ago. Her identity was verified against a passport at onboarding. But the person standing in the doorway right now — is she actually Sarah M.? Nobody in the building can confirm that. Nobody tries.
Six hours later, a resident's family member files a safeguarding concern. By the time anyone investigates, "Sarah M." has moved on to another facility. The paper sign-in book has an illegible signature. The agency confirms they sent someone, but can't confirm who arrived.
This is the safeguarding gap. And it's open in care homes across the country, every single night.
The Scale of the Problem
The UK care sector employs approximately 1.5 million workers. Staff turnover in adult social care sits around 28%, one of the highest rates of any sector. To fill the gaps, care homes rely heavily on agency and temporary staff — workers who rotate between multiple facilities, sometimes covering shifts at different homes in the same week.
According to CQC data, 39% of safeguarding concerns raised in care settings involve staff or volunteers, not external actors. These aren't strangers breaking in. They're people who walked through the front door and signed a book.
The Care Quality Commission's fundamental standards — specifically Regulation 19: Fit and Proper Persons Employed — require providers to have "robust recruitment processes" and to ensure staff are "fit and proper persons." But recruitment processes verify someone once, at point of hire. They don't verify who actually shows up for the Tuesday night shift three months later.
What CQC Inspections Actually Reveal
When CQC inspectors arrive — often unannounced — one of their standard questions is straightforward: "Who was on shift on Tuesday night?"
The answer, in the majority of care homes, comes from one of three places:
- A paper sign-in book with handwritten names and signatures, many illegible
- A rota spreadsheet that shows who was scheduled, not who attended
- A verbal confirmation from the shift lead, relying on memory
None of these constitute verifiable proof. None of them link a specific, verified individual to a specific shift at a specific time. The gap between "who was supposed to be here" and "who was actually here" is where safeguarding failures live.
For care homes rated Requires Improvement or Inadequate, this gap is often a contributing factor. The CQC's own reports repeatedly flag insufficient systems for monitoring staff attendance and identity as a risk to residents.
The Agency Worker Blind Spot
Agency staff present a particular challenge. They are verified by their employment agency — DBS checked, right-to-work confirmed, references obtained. But that verification is linked to a name on a database, not to a physical person arriving at a specific facility.
The care home receiving an agency worker typically gets a name and a confirmation from the agency. When the worker arrives, they might show an agency ID card. Or they might not. The night shift coordinator — often stretched thin, covering multiple duties — takes them at their word.
This creates an environment where:
- A worker could give a false name and operate under someone else's credentials
- A worker flagged at one facility could continue working at others through a different agency
- A worker without valid DBS clearance could cover shifts using a colleague's booking
- There is no real-time audit trail connecting the verified individual to the shift they worked
These aren't hypothetical risks. They are the documented patterns behind safeguarding failures that the sector has been grappling with for years.
What Digital Verified Check-In Changes
Replace the paper sign-in book with a verified digital check-in, and the entire safeguarding picture transforms.
When an agency worker arrives for a shift, they scan a QR code. That scan does three things simultaneously:
1. Confirms identity in real time. The person scanning is matched to their verified profile — not a name on a rota, but a cryptographically confirmed individual. The care home knows, with certainty, who just walked in.
2. Creates a tamper-proof audit trail. Every check-in generates a timestamped, immutable record. When CQC asks "who was on shift Tuesday night?" the answer isn't a paper book. It's a digital log showing exactly who arrived, when, and that their identity was verified at the door.
3. Links the person to their credentials. A verified check-in can confirm not just identity but DBS status, training completion, and any role-specific clearances — all current, all in real time. Not "checked six months ago." Checked now.
For care home managers, this means shifting from reactive safeguarding — investigating after something goes wrong — to preventive safeguarding. The system doesn't allow an unverified person to start a shift. The gap closes before an incident occurs.
The Compliance Dividend
Beyond safeguarding, digital verified check-in addresses the compliance burden that care providers face daily. CQC inspections become straightforward when every shift, every worker, and every verification is logged and auditable. Insurance claims are supported by verifiable records. Family complaints can be investigated with factual data rather than conflicting recollections.
The care sector is under immense pressure — understaffed, underfunded, and under scrutiny. The staffing crisis means families are asking harder questions about who is looking after their loved ones. The last thing providers need is another complex system. What they need is something that takes 30 seconds at shift start and eliminates an entire category of risk.
The paper sign-in book was designed for a world where everyone who showed up was who they said they were. That world doesn't exist anymore. The safeguarding gap is real, it's measurable, and it's closable.
See how Certifyd brings verified identity to care home staffing or explore our compliance solutions.