Error response form
What is the error response process?
The Public Services Reform (Scotland) Act 2010 specifies that the Care Inspectorate must produce a report for all inspections carried out. Section 57(2) also states that the provider of the inspected service must receive an initial draft of the report and an opportunity to comment on it.
Collaboration with you as a provider is key to our inspection approach. Ongoing professional dialogue and thorough inspection feedback make the process as transparent as possible and allows for discussion and clarification of any uncertainties early on. You also have opportunities to evidence any successes, achievements and plans for improvement throughout inspections. This collaborative approach should mean that the information in the draft report is familiar to you, and nothing comes as a surprise. However, we welcome your feedback and have an error response process which we encourage you to use. This fulfils our legal obligations and includes the error response form (ERF) for you to give your comments and feedback on the contents of the draft inspection report.
Other ways to feedback to the Care Inspectorate
We understand that sometimes you may wish to share your views on our general approach to inspections. The error response process is primarily about a specific inspection report, but there are other ways in which you can provide feedback to us.
For example, you can provide feedback using the Inspection Satisfaction Questionnaire process. If you are unhappy with how the Care Inspectorate has carried out our regulatory functions, you can make a complaint here.
Accessing the ERF
When we send you your draft report in eForms, we will include a letter prompting you to review it and return an ERF. This video shows you how to log into your eForms account.
Completing the ERF
Once you have reviewed the draft report you can respond to us by completing the ERF. We want to ensure the report is an accurate representation of the service at the time of the inspection and that the report is clear to the public. You can therefore comment on any aspect of the report.
You can access the ERF from the ‘documents’ section of your eForms (screenshot below). On a mobile device this may appear as a drop-down menu.
When you are in the documents page you should select ‘current’ from the menu on the left, or from the drop-down menu.
You will then see the ERF, which you can open by clicking on it.
When you open the form, you will have the option to select that you agree for us to finalise the report without changes. If you select that you agree and submit this to us, we will receive a ‘blank’ ERF stating that you agree for the report to be published without any changes. It will be finalised and appear on our website shortly after.
If you select that you do not agree to it being finalised without changes, you will then need to give us more details by completing the form. To tell us about the issues you have identified, you need to create an item on the form. You should use the ‘new’ button to create an item for each issue you have identified; this allows us to easily see each issue you are raising and respond to them in turn.
Complete each part of the form. Select the section of the report that your issue relates to from the drop-down menu. This means we can easily navigate to the correct area of the report to review it. If there is more than one issue in the same section of the report, create a new item for each one.
There are then two free-text fields for you to complete. In the ‘Describe the Error’ section you should explain the issue you have identified and, if helpful, copy the relevant section of the report text. Use the ‘Proposed Correction’ box to offer us your alternative suggestion for this section of the report.
There is also the option to upload attachments to the ERF. Please ensure these are relevant to the inspection, clearly named and referred to in the ‘Proposed Correction’ box. This allows the inspector to assess whether the attachment is relevant to our inspection findings.
You do not need to complete the form in one go; you can save it and return to it later. If you want to amend any item you have created, you can click on it to re-open and edit it. Once you are ready to send the ERF to us, click the submit button to send it through eForms.
You have 10 working days from receipt of the draft report to respond. Extensions to this may be agreed by your inspector in certain circumstances. If we do not hear from you in the agreed timescale, the report will automatically be finalised and published on our website.
The ERF is the only opportunity to comment on the report and once we respond to you with a letter, the report will usually be finalised and published on our website. To ensure we can respond appropriately, please be clear when describing any issues and proposed corrections and make sure you create new items for each issue.
Please note the inspection completion date that appears on the front page of the report is the date formal feedback was given and is populated on the report automatically by our systems. The service details reflect the details we have on the digital portal. You can review these and keep them up to date by logging into the digital portal.
How we respond
When we receive an ERF, the lead inspector will respond to you using our error response letter. This is sent from the eForms system in the same way as the ERF. Our timescale for this is 10 working days from the date the ERF is submitted. If we need longer than this to respond, for example due to staff absence or needing more time to review our evidence, the inspector will advise you of this.
In all but very exceptional circumstances (see below) the process is complete once we have sent the error response letter, and the report will be published on the website.
If we need to clarify any of the points raised, the lead inspector will contact you to arrange a telephone call or meeting, to ensure we provide an accurate response.
A team manager or more senior manager from the Care Inspectorate may also be involved in reviewing the inspection evidence with the lead inspector and advise on any changes. The letter will outline if a team manager or anyone else has been involved.
It is important to note that, if you ask us to amend our draft report or revise the evaluations (grades) awarded, we may need to review all our evidence from the inspection to reach a conclusion. This is because our findings are based on our overall assessment of the evidence we look at. Evaluations (grades) are based on our grading criteria, which requires us to consider the strengths and weaknesses of a service based on the evidence we have gathered.
There are certain circumstances in which we may accept your proposed correction and amend our report. These include where our review of the evidence shows that:
- the report contains factual inaccuracies, such as names, times, dates and places,
- the report does not reflect an accurate representation of the evidence,
- evaluations (grades) are based on inaccuracies or discrepancies in the evidence,
- evaluations (grades) can be demonstrated to be unjustified as they are not reflective of the relevant evidence (which is not in dispute).
In most instances, if you tell us, in your ERF, that you feel the evaluation (grade) we have awarded is inaccurate against our grading criteria, a team manager will review the evidence gathered on inspection, and any additional evidence with the inspector. They will reach a conclusion as to whether this supports a change in evaluation (grade).
Depending on the findings from their review, the team manager could conclude:
- the proposed evaluations are appropriate,
- the proposed evaluations be increased,
- the proposed evaluations be decreased.
If the team manager concludes that the evidence does not support the evaluation (grade) in the draft report and a higher evaluation (grade) is more accurate, we will inform you of this in our response letter. The report and evaluations will be amended and published on our website.
In very rare circumstances, the team manager may conclude that a lower evaluation than the one originally awarded is more appropriate. In these exceptional cases, the error response letter will clearly explain why this decision has been made. We will arrange a meeting with you to explain our decision and the processes that have been followed. You will then have an opportunity to make comment on the revised draft report by email before it is finalised.
If our review of the evidence does not identify any errors, we will not make changes to the report. This will be clearly stated in our response letter.
Joint inspections of services for children and young people at risk of harm
At the request of Scottish Ministers, between 2021 and 2025 the Care Inspectorate led on joint inspections of services for children and young people at risk of harm.
The remit of these joint inspections was to consider the effectiveness of services for children and young people up to the age of 18 at risk of harm. The inspections looked at the differences community planning partnerships are making to the lives of children and young people at risk of harm and their families.
These joint inspections aimed to provide assurance on the extent to which services, working together, could demonstrate that:
- Children and young people are safer because risks have been identified early and responded to effectively.
- Children and young people’s lives improve with high-quality planning and support, ensuring they experience sustained, loving and nurturing relationships to keep them safe from further harm.
- Children and young people and families are meaningfully and appropriately involved in decisions about their lives. They influence service planning, delivery and improvement.
- Collaborative strategic leadership, planning and operational management ensure high standards of service delivery.
We will shortly be producing an overview report. You can access individual inspection reports here.
Children and young people subject to compulsory supervision orders
These pages are currently under development.
Scottish Ministers have asked us to work with scrutiny partners to take a more focused look at the experiences and outcomes of children and young people subject to compulsory supervision orders and living at home with parents.
Our joint inspections will look at the services provided for them by health visitors, school nurses, teachers, doctors, social workers, police officers and lots of other people who work with them and their families.
We will be starting this programme of scrutiny in summer 2025 and we will complete three inspections with this focus by April 2026. We will continue to review and revise the approach over the course of these inspections.
Find out more information about our approach below:
More details about our approach
Our inspections will report on the experiences of children and young people subject to compulsory supervision orders living at home with their parents. When we use the term ‘children and young people’ in this page we are referring to this group.
Through a joint scrutiny approach, we will consider the experiences and views of children and young people. We will explore how well services are directed and delivered to ensure children are supported to live at home within their families to achieve positive outcomes.
The scope and timeline of the joint inspections
- Our legislative basis is the Public Services Reform (Scotland) Act 2010, section 115.
- We undertake joint inspections with scrutiny partners, including Healthcare Improvement Scotland, His Majesty’s Inspectorate of Education, His Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary in Scotland and young inspection volunteers. At times, we also involve associate assessors in our joint inspections.
- We will identify up to four local authority areas in 2025/2026 in which to conduct our joint inspections.
- The joint inspections will have a multi-agency scrutiny approach, liaising with community planning partners and corporate parenting partners responsible and accountable for this area of practice.
- We will take a scoping approach to our joint inspections, that is, learning iteratively as the inspection progresses to determine the best ways to seek the evidence required.
- We will conduct each joint inspection over a 12-week period, publishing one final report per local authority area.
- We will focus on a retrospective two-year period and scrutinise the impact of services for children and young people in that period of time.
The principles of the joint inspections
We will use a rights-based approach in the joint inspections, embedding the experiences of children and young people at the heart of planning, implementation and analysis of findings. Our joint inspections are underpinned by the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child. For example, we respect the right of children and young people to have their views heard by making participation of children, young people and families a core element of our approach. Our approach and design will reflect what children and families have told us matter the most to them, as encapsulated within the Promise.
We will consider the planning and progress that has been made by children’s services partnerships as they seek to keep The Promise. We will consider the five Promise Foundations and related priorities of family, care, voice, people and scaffolding which enable children to grow up loved, safe and respected.
Our approach and framework
Our approach will be proportionate to the evidence required, with a hybrid model of on-site and virtual activities. Our methods will include gathering information from local partnerships about the relevant services they provide and reviewing publicly available documents.
We will use the quality framework for children and young people in need of care and protection (November 2022). This framework is informed by the principles of the European Framework for Quality Management (EFQM) model which incorporates three tenets:
- Direction – clarity of purpose and strategy to achieve aims
- Execution – implementation of the strategy through delivery
- Results – what results have been achieved
Our approach to reporting
We will publish one written report following each joint inspection. We are committed to improving accessible reporting specific to children and young people, this will involve further consultation with our young inspection volunteers.
In our report we will consider three key lines of enquiry. We will evaluate four quality indicators on our six-point scale. These are:
- Quality indicator 2.1: Impact on children and young people
- Quality indicator 5.3: Care planning, managing risk and effective intervention
- Quality indicator 5.4: Involving individual children, young people and families
- Quality indicator 9.2: Leadership of strategy and direction
Resources
Our resources pages provide information for community planning partnerships (CPP) about the process for the joint inspection of services for children and young people. This includes services for children under the age of 18 years, or young people up to 26 years if they have been previously looked after.
Getting involved
What you think really matters. If we are inspecting your area, and you have experience of services, you may want to speak to us about the help that you have been getting.
We will offer a range of ways for you to give us feedback. As well as a survey we will arrange one-to-one discussions and group meetings. Our one-to-one discussions can take place in person, or we can contact you by phone or other ways such as Facetime or MS Teams.
If you give us information anonymously, we may not be able to get in contact with you if you raise concerns about your own safety or the safety of anyone else. If you have such concerns, we would encourage you to contact your local authority and ask for their child protection or adult protection service. You can also contact Childline on 0800 1111. If we have any concerns about the safety of individuals, we will share this with protection agencies in the relevant area.
Our inspection team also includes young inspection volunteers. These are young people aged 18 – 26 with experience of care services who help us with our inspections. If you are a young person, you can choose to speak with one of them and you can have someone to support you when you meet them. If you are a young person and want to know more about becoming a young inspection volunteer or how to get involved, click here to find out more.
How we do it
Our inspections last for a number of months. We collect information about the area before we visit it. This helps us to understand what happens there and what is affecting the way that services are being provided.
During the inspection, a team of inspectors from the Care Inspectorate, Education Scotland, HM Inspectorate of Constabulary Scotland and Health Improvement Scotland will:
- speak with the staff
- speak with children and young people and listen to their views
- speak with parents and carers
- read information about the children and young people.
This gives us the chance to find out if children, young people and their families are getting the help that they need and if services are making a difference to their lives. What individual people tell us during inspection is confidential. Our reports do not include any information about them or their family, or anything that could identify them. However, we do have a duty to pass on information if there are concerns about someone’s safety.
We have surveys for children, young people and families and we use and safeguard the data gathered from these in the same way as we do with what you tell us in person. Our approach to participation during inspection reflects the importance we give to hearing from children and young people. We also have a staff survey which also enables us to maximise the feedback we get from those working across services.
After our inspection, we publish a report on our website about what we found for the area. Our inspection reports set out what works well and what could improve. We expect the community planning partnership to take action on any recommendations we make for improvements.
Overview
As part of our strategic scrutiny plan for this year we will work with scrutiny partners to take a more focused look at the experiences and outcomes of children and young people subject to compulsory supervision orders and living at home with parents. Our joint inspections will look at the services provided for them by health workers (for example, school nurses, health visitors and doctors), social workers, police officers and lots of other people who work with them and their families.
One of the foundations of the Promise is about supporting families to stay together and emphasis is placed on the importance of providing timely support to ensure children can stay in their families wherever it is safe to do so. By considering the experiences of children who are subject to compulsory supervision orders and living at home with their parents, we aim to better understand what is helping to improve outcomes for children and young people and what is getting in the way.
Children and young people have told us about the importance of being able to experience sincere human contact and enduring relationships. Our approach therefore looks carefully at how well services and systems are organised so that children and young people can experience continuity in their care and develop and sustain lasting relationships. Our inspections also consider whether legal measures are being used appropriately to achieve security and stability for children.
Staff who are well trained and who feel valued and empowered are more likely to be able to provide high quality services for children and young people. We therefore explore how well staff are supported to carry out their task.
We know that partners recognise that assessment and planning are critical to ensure the safety of, and improving outcomes for, children and young people. However, we also know that performance in assessment and planning is not as consistently strong across the country as it needs to be. We will look to see if robust quality assurance and high quality reflective supervision are in place to support these important processes.
Strong collaborative leadership is essential and challenging in the context of providing high quality public services in an integrated landscape. We consider the effectiveness of leadership and how well leaders can demonstrate what difference they are making to the lives of children and young people.
Read more about the focus of these inspections here.
Justice social work: Self-evaluation of performance, quality and outcomes
Aim 2 of the National Strategy for Community Justice is to “Ensure that robust and high-quality community interventions and public protection arrangements are consistently available across Scotland”. In relation to community sentences, there is an associated priority action to “Ensure that those given community sentences are supervised and supported appropriately to protect the public, promote desistence from offending and enable rehabilitation by delivering high quality, consistently available, trauma-informed services and programmes.”
Key to delivering on these intentions, and the overarching aim, is the ability of justice social work services to demonstrate that the supervision and support offered to those on community sentences is of a high quality. To develop an overview of what was working well and where improvement was required in this regard, the Care Inspectorate undertook a national review, using a self-evaluation approach between September 2024 and March 2025.
The review sought to:
- evaluate the extent to which justice social work services were able to evidence performance, quality and outcomes in relation to community-based sentences.
- explore the factors that impacted justice social work services’ ability to confidently and robustly demonstrate the effectiveness and impact of community support and supervision.
As part of this work, all 32 local authority justice social work services completed a structured self-evaluation in which they considered their current approaches to gathering and reporting on performance, quality and outcomes and the factors that were enabling or hindering this work.
Thereafter, we undertook a range of activities to validate the self-evaluations in six local authority justice services. This allowed us to better understand the strengths and challenges at a local level. The activities included:
- a review of documentary evidence referenced in the local authority self-evaluation
- focus groups and interviews with senior leaders, operational managers and staff
- focus groups and interviews with people on community sentences
We published a report of our findings in May 2025. The report contains more detail on the methods we used.
Thematic review of prison-based social work
In July 2023, we commenced a joint thematic review of prison-based social work services, in partnership with His Majesty’s Inspectorate of Prisons in Scotland (HMIPS). Phase 1 of this thematic review considered the strengths and challenges in the governance, leadership, and accountability of prison-based social work services in Scotland and highlighted areas for improvement. The review sought to explore:
- governance, leadership and direction
- partnership working, including commissioning arrangements and resourcing
- policies, procedures, and guidance
- management and support of staff
- performance management and quality assurance
As part of the review, we gathered the views of people in custody who had been working with prison-based social work services. Other activities included:
- a series of scoping meetings with stakeholders including the Scottish Government, the SPS, Social Work Scotland, the Risk Management Authority, and Community Justice Scotland
- a review of relevant strategies, policies, guidance, procedures and other documentation relating to prison-based social work services
- a staff survey distributed to all prison-based social work staff
- focus groups and interviews with key partners.
We published a report of our findings in April 2024. The report contains more details on the methods we used.
Evaluating the quality of prison-based social work practice was outwith the scope of this first phase of the review. Within the report, a commitment was made to a further phase of work in this regard. In the longer term, this will aim to consider the quality of prison-based social work practice, the efficiency of collaboration with community-based justice social work services, and effectiveness in delivering intended outcomes for people.
Joint review of diversion from prosecution
In this joint review, we sought to assess the operation and impact of diversion from prosecution in Scotland. Working in partnership we provided an overview of diversion practice from a policing, prosecution and justice social work perspective, highlighted what was working well and explored any barriers to the more effective use of diversion.
The review was carried out by HM Inspectorate of Constabulary in Scotland (HMICS), HM Inspectorate of Prosecution in Scotland (IPS), the Care Inspectorate, and HM Inspectorate of Prisons for Scotland (HMIPS) (the scrutiny partners).
We considered:
- the extent to which the police, the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service (COPFS) and justice social work, alongside other community justice partners, shared a vision for diversion from prosecution and collaborated on a strategy for delivery, while respecting the important principle of independent prosecutorial decision-making
- the effectiveness of systems and processes that supported diversion from prosecution and the progress made in implementing the national guidelines on diversion
- the extent to which the impact of diversion was understood and the intended outcomes were being achieved
We considered the individual and collective roles that the justice partners play at the various stages in the diversion process:
- the Standard Prosecution Report (SPR)
- the decision to divert
- the referral to justice social work
- the suitability assessment and the response by COPFS
- the diversion intervention
- the completion report and the response by COPFS
- communication with the accused
- communication with the complainer.
In support of our review, we gathered evidence from a range of sources including:
- a review of relevant strategies, policies, guidance, procedures and other documentation relating to diversion from prosecution
- analysis of data on diversion
- a survey of all community justice partnerships in Scotland regarding the operation of diversion from prosecution in their local area
- extensive interviews with those involved or with an interest in the diversion process
- a review of cases in which an initial decision to divert the accused from prosecution had been taken by COPFS, as well as some cases in which diversion did not appear to have been considered.
We published a report of our findings in February 2023. The review report provides more detail on our methods and full details of our findings and recommendations.