The CQC Single Assessment Framework explained for registered managers

What the Single Assessment Framework is

The Care Quality Commission's Single Assessment Framework (SAF) replaced the previous Key Lines of Enquiry. It keeps the five key questions — safe, effective, caring, responsive and well-led — but underneath each one sits a set of quality statements. These are written as "we" statements describing what good care looks like from the provider's side.

Quality statements and evidence categories

Each quality statement is assessed against six evidence categories:

1. People's experience of health and care services
2. Feedback from staff and leaders
3. Feedback from partners
4. Observation
5. Processes
6. Outcomes

Not every category is used for every statement, but you should be able to point to evidence in each one that applies. A good habit is to file evidence under the key question and the quality statement it supports — the Evidence Folder in your dashboard is structured this way.

Scoring and ratings

Inspectors score each quality statement from 1 (significant shortfalls) to 4 (exceptional). Scores are combined to produce a rating for each key question and an overall rating. Because scoring is continuous, a single strong statement won't rescue a weak key question — consistency matters.

What to do this month

• Map your current policies to the quality statements they support.
• Ask five staff and five people who use the service the same three questions and record the answers.
• Check that your last three audits led to a recorded action and a check that the action worked.

If you are unsure how a specific statement applies to your service, ask the AI Compliance Assistant and, where needed, it will route your question to a specialist.