Keys, Key Safes & Home Access

Access

• Use only the access method in the support plan — key safe, family answering, or knock-and-wait. Announce yourself clearly as you enter.
• Key-safe codes are confidential security information: never write a code where it appears with an address, never share codes with anyone (including family members — direct them to the office), and report immediately if you think a code is known to someone it shouldn't be.
• Access notes in the Hub are extra-sensitive; every view is logged. Look codes up when you need them rather than keeping private lists.

If there is no answer

When a client who should be home doesn't answer and you cannot get in — or you can see or hear something worrying — this is a potential emergency, not a missed visit:

• Check the obvious: right time, right address, back door, a note, neighbours who know them.
• Phone the client, then the office/on-call, before leaving the property.
• If there are signs of collapse or distress — post piled up, lights wrong, sounds inside, visible through a window — call 999 and stay until help arrives. Never assume someone else will act.
• Record the outcome whatever happens, so the next visit knows.

Leaving the home

• Leave the home as secure as you found it: doors locked as the plan requires, keys returned to the safe with the dial scrambled, windows and appliances as the person wants them.
• Report lost keys or key-safe faults the same day — a lost key is a safeguarding issue, not an inconvenience.