Social worker abused her position for financial gain, says conduct committee

HCPC to strike off social worker for leading service users to believe that a care provider she worked for was their only option

By Tristan Donovan on February 24, 2016 in Domiciliary care, Fitness to practise, Personalisation

A social worker who used her position to get service users to use a domiciliary care provider she had a financial interest in is to be struck off.

The decision follows a conduct hearing where the HCPC panel found that the social worker concealed her position as the registered manager of the KCL Care from Nottingham City Council while temporarily employed by the authority as a community care officer during 2013.

The panel also found that she led four service users and their families to believe that KCL, which the hearing heard was owned by her husband or partner, was the only care provider they could choose despite the council having a list of approved providers.

As a result three service users used direct payments to pay for KCL’s services and a spot contract was created to pay the company to provide domiciliary care to the fourth person.

CQC misled

While the service users and families said they were happy with the services they got from KCL they told the hearing that they had not been informed that alternative providers were available for them to use.

One service user said he told the registrant that he felt KCL’s £14 per hour fee was “steep” and that he wanted to use CareWatch, a provider he had used for about 10 years. He told the hearing that if he had been given a choice he would have gone with a less expensive provider than KCL.

The service users and their family members said they were unaware that the registrant also worked for KCL.

The panel also found that the social worker misled the Care Quality Commission by telling them that her position at Nottingham Council would end earlier than it would when she applied to become KCL’s registered manager.

Vulnerable exploited

The HCPC panel concluded that the registrant’s conduct was dishonest. “She abused her position of trust to exploit vulnerable service users and undermine their autonomy for her own financial gain,” it concluded before ruling that she be struck from the social work register.

The social worker is due to be removed from the register on 15 March when the period in which she can appeal against the decision ends. In the meantime an interim suspension order is in place.

More from Community Care

Special guardianship reforms do not address time pressures facing social workers

Social work managers in NHS report rise in stress and bullying

4 Responses to Social worker abused her position for financial gain, says conduct committee

catherine February 24, 2016 at 8:22 pm #

same happened for me with my son, they decided that the only care provider that would be apropriate for my son was on outside of their service catchment area, they gain money from another council to fund the care required. in the end i had to get a report done on my son who was eventually found to function at age 7 years and below. they had placed him with adults and he was being hyposexualised in their care.
Calum February 25, 2016 at 12:15 pm #

Appalling.
Stuart February 25, 2016 at 4:31 pm #

For a change I’m happy to congratulate the hcpc and whoever was involved in bringing this matter to their attention.
Too often I see questionable value judgements and excessively punitive decisions from hcpc but this is simple – if the facts as reported are accurate the worker can have no excuse. Good job it was uncovered.
May February 29, 2016 at 5:33 pm #

Situations like these are definitely an eye-opener for anyone else who is considering pulling such a stunt. I think its horrific that you can manipulate vulnerable persons. It really doesn’t do much for the perception of social workers but at least making others aware prevents it in future! Glad it was identified!