Reviews policy

iCare does not yet let families leave reviews of a care home. We're publishing this policy ahead of that feature, not after it, so the rules are settled before anyone's words are on the record — and so you can see now how we intend to handle something as sensitive as a family's account of a relative's care.

What we intend to build

Each care home page will carry a place for a family member, resident, or visitor to leave a rating and a written review. Reviews will be attached to the specific home they describe and will sit alongside, never inside, the CQC's own rating — the two are different things measured by different people, and we won't blend them into one number.

Moderation, before publication

• Every review will be checked before it goes live, not after.
• We will reject reviews that name individual staff or residents, make unverifiable clinical claims, or amount to a personal attack rather than an account of the care experienced.
• A provider will be able to respond publicly to a review, but not to have it removed simply for being negative.
• We will remove a review if it's shown to be fabricated, or if it discloses personal information about a third party without their consent.

Aggregate ratings

We will not display an aggregate review rating for a home until there is a genuine body of reviews behind it. A single review, or a handful, will be shown as what they are — individual accounts — rather than rolled into a number that implies more consensus than exists.

Personal data

A review about care given to someone else — a parent, a partner — can incidentally reveal personal information about that person, including details relating to their health. We'll ask reviewers to write about the experience of care rather than clinical specifics, and we will handle any personal data submitted in line with our privacy policy and UK GDPR.

If you have thoughts on this policy before reviews launch, or want to know when they do, you can get in touch.