A care provider in Bushey has been told it has made "some improvements" after action had to be taken to protect the health, safety and welfare of people using the service.

The Care Quality Commission (CQC) demanded Bushey House DCA, based in High Street, improve after the independent health and adult social care regulator found it did not meet national standards in March.

The CQC issued its first report in February after the unannounced inspection over four days in January and said the service did not have appropriate arrangements in place for obtaining people’s consent.

Bushey House DCA is a domiciliary care agency which provides support and personal care to people in their homes.

Along with reports of staff often being late, the inspection also found staff did not know what people’s support needs were and often did not have legitimate references for staff.

It was also noted some staff had a limited command of the English language.

The provider was issued a warning notice and a follow up inspection in March highlighted improvements but said its record-keeping needed improvement.

The report, issued last week, said the agency had undertaken reviews of people's care needs and had replaced the old care plans with a new-style plan which provided lots of information on how people wanted to be cared for.

Inspectors said they saw evidence the agency now had sufficient numbers of staff with the right skills and experience to deliver an appropriate level of care and support to people.

However, people were not protected from the risks of unsafe or inappropriate care and treatment because accurate and appropriate records were not always maintained.

Although it was noted there were some systems in place to make sure information was shared easily, inspectors said this was unreliable and needed to be improved as not all staff were following the same procedure and information was not always recorded but spoken, which could lead to it being recorded inaccurately.

Linus Kadzere, who works for the care provider, said: "We had a CQC inspection in January and concerns were raised.

"Our biggest problem was annual client reviews had not been done at the time of the inspection.

"We have since reviewed all our clients and all our carers have up to date DBS and references.

"Two members of staff have joined the team. Staff training is now ongoing as we now have a dedicated trainer in place."

He said they had up to April 30 to improve record-keeping but had already done so.

He added: "We now have metal lockers and dedicated lockable records room.

"In brief, we are delivering good quality care right now."

The provider has been asked to send a report of improvements to the CQC by April 30.