Section 42 enquiry: what it is and what the provider records

What a section 42 enquiry is

The duty is in section 42 of the Care Act 2014, and it sits with the local authority. Section 42(2): “The local authority must make (or cause to be made) whatever enquiries it thinks necessary to enable it to decide whether any action should be taken in the adult’s case (whether under this Part or otherwise) and, if so, what and by whom.” It applies where the authority “has reasonable cause to suspect that an adult in its area (whether or not ordinarily resident there)” meets the three conditions in section 42(1), set out below. The section has been in force since 1 April 2015.

Chapter 14 of the Care and support statutory guidance explains what the duty under section 42 means in practice. Paragraph 14.77: “An enquiry is the action taken or instigated by the local authority in response to a concern that abuse or neglect may be taking place. An enquiry could range from a conversation with the adult, or if they lack capacity, or have substantial difficulty in understanding the enquiry their representative or advocate, prior to initiating a formal enquiry under section 42, right through to a much more formal multi-agency plan or course of action.” Paragraph 14.78: “The purpose of the enquiry is to decide whether or not the local authority or another organisation, or person, should do something to help and protect the adult.” Paragraph 14.10 puts it more briefly: an enquiry “should establish whether any action needs to be taken to prevent or stop abuse or neglect and if so, by who.” The duty does not end with a decision: where the adult remains at risk, it “continues until it decides what action is necessary to protect the adult and by whom and ensures itself that this action has been taken” (the text after paragraph 14.92).

A section 42 enquiry does not replace the provider’s own safeguarding responsibilities. Paragraph 14.9 says safeguarding “is not a substitute for: providers’ responsibilities to provide safe and high quality care and support”, and paragraph 14.68 says that in a regulated setting “The first responsibility to act must be with the employing organisation as provider of the service.” Our care home safeguarding policy guide covers that duty and Regulation 13 at length.

When the duty arises, and when the criteria are not met

Section 42(1) sets three conditions, and all three must be met. The adult:

• “has needs for care and support (whether or not the authority is meeting any of those needs)”. An adult with care and support needs who arranges and pays for their own care can still meet it.
• “is experiencing, or is at risk of, abuse or neglect”. The risk of abuse or neglect is enough; the local authority does not have to wait for harm.
• “as a result of those needs is unable to protect himself or herself against the abuse or neglect or the risk of it”. This is the link between the person’s care and support needs and their ability to protect themselves, and it is often the condition that decides the matter.

Section 42(3) adds that “Abuse” includes financial abuse, which includes “having money or other property stolen”, “being defrauded”, “being put under pressure in relation to money or other property” and “having money or other property misused”. The safeguarding duties apply “regardless of whether the adult lacks mental capacity or not, and regardless of setting”, other than prisons and approved premises (paragraph 14.6). Deciding whether the test is met is the local authority’s job, and the threshold is reasonable cause to suspect, not proof.

When the section 42 criteria are not met, there is no duty to enquire, but the local authority may still act. Paragraph 14.44: “Local authorities may choose to undertake safeguarding enquiries for people where there is not a section 42 enquiry duty, if the local authority believes it is proportionate to do so, and will enable the local authority to promote the person’s wellbeing and support a preventative agenda.” CQC’s assessment framework for local authorities on safeguarding describes a good standard as one where staff take “a proactive approach to early signs of abuse and neglect, including concerns that are not eligible for section 42 enquiries”.

For the provider, little turns on the screening decision. Regulation 13 of the Health and Social Care Act 2008 (Regulated Activities) Regulations 2014 still requires “Systems and processes … to investigate, immediately upon becoming aware of, any allegation or evidence of such abuse”, and Regulation 18 of the Care Quality Commission (Registration) Regulations 2009 still requires notification of “any abuse or allegation of abuse in relation to a service user”. And “It is not for front line staff to second-guess the outcome of an enquiry in deciding whether or not to share their concerns” (paragraph 14.199). Record the local authority’s decision, its date and reason, and what the service did next.

Who carries out the enquiry, and when the provider is asked to

Paragraph 14.100: “Although the local authority is the lead agency for making enquiries, it may require others to undertake them.” “In many cases a professional who already knows the adult will be the best person.” That is what “cause to be made” means: the local authority can cause others to make enquiries, but it keeps the duty and “is able to challenge the body making the enquiry if it considers that the process and/or outcome is unsatisfactory.”

When the concern is about the service itself, the guidance expects the provider to investigate. Paragraph 14.70: “The employer should investigate any concern (and provide any additional support that the adult may need) unless there is compelling reason why it is inappropriate or unsafe to do this”, such as “a serious conflict of interest on the part of the employer” or “a matter that requires investigation by the police”. Paragraph 14.71 gives the example of “a family-run business where institutional abuse is alleged, or where the manager or owner of the service is implicated”, and adds: “All those carrying out such enquiries should have received appropriate training.”

Paragraph 14.78: “If the local authority decides that another organisation should make the enquiry, for example a care provider, then the local authority should be clear about timescales, the need to know the outcomes of the enquiry and what action will follow if this is not done.” When your service is asked to carry out a section 42 enquiry, agree and write down at the start:

1. The question and the deadline: what the enquiry must establish, when the outcome is due and to whom.
2. Who will carry it out: someone trained, and far enough from the events to be credible. If the manager or owner is implicated, ask the local authority who should lead.
3. Whether the police are involved. “A criminal investigation by the police takes priority over all other enquiries” (paragraph 14.91), so agree what the service may do, and when.
4. What clinical input is needed. “health professionals should undertake enquiries and treatment plans relating to medicines management or pressure sores” (paragraph 14.82).
5. How the adult will be involved, and whether an independent advocate is needed (see the next section).
6. How the member of staff is treated. They “should be made aware of their rights under employment legislation and any internal disciplinary procedures” (paragraph 14.112), and those procedures should be “compatible with the responsibility to protect adults at risk of abuse or neglect” (paragraph 14.116).

CQC’s guidance on Regulation 13 states the provider’s part: “Where appropriate, staff must follow local safeguarding arrangements to make sure that allegations are investigated internally or externally. Providers must make sure that they respond without delay to the findings of any investigations.” The enquiry template and timescales come from your local Safeguarding Adults Board’s multi-agency procedures; use your own board’s version.

Making Safeguarding Personal, and how an enquiry ends

Paragraph 14.15: “Making safeguarding personal means it should be person-led and outcome-focused. It engages the person in a conversation about how best to respond to their safeguarding situation in a way that enhances involvement, choice and control as well as improving quality of life, wellbeing and safety.” An enquiry “will usually start with asking the adult their view and wishes which will often determine what next steps to take” (paragraph 14.93). Its objectives, in paragraph 14.94, are to:

• “establish facts”
• “ascertain the adult’s views and wishes”
• “assess the needs of the adult for protection, support and redress and how they might be met”
• “protect from the abuse and neglect, in accordance with the wishes of the adult”
• “make decisions as to what follow-up action should be taken with regard to the person or organisation responsible for the abuse or neglect”
• “enable the adult to achieve resolution and recovery”

“The adult should always be involved from the beginning of the enquiry unless there are exceptional circumstances that would increase the risk of abuse” (paragraph 14.80), and where they have substantial difficulty in being involved and no one appropriate to support them, “the local authority must arrange for an independent advocate”. Under the Mental Capacity Act 2005 capacity is presumed; where the adult may lack capacity, “their capacity must always be assessed and any decision made in their best interests” (paragraph 14.108). “If the adult has the mental capacity to make informed decisions about their safety and they do not want any action to be taken, this does not preclude the sharing of information with relevant professional colleagues” (paragraph 14.92).

How an enquiry ends. Paragraph 14.110: “Once enquiries are completed, the outcome should be notified to the local authority which should then determine with the adult what, if any, further action is necessary and acceptable. It is for the local authority to determine the appropriateness of the outcome of the enquiry.” Agreed action for the adult “should be recorded on their care plan” (paragraph 14.110). Follow-up “could include disciplinary, complaints or criminal investigations or work by contracts managers and CQC to improve care standards” (paragraph 14.105), and planning continues either way, “as many enquiries may be inconclusive” (paragraph 14.106). The care plan and risk assessment should then show what the service changed.

What the provider must keep and be able to produce

Paragraph 14.180: “Whenever a complaint or allegation of abuse is made, all agencies should keep clear and accurate records and each agency should identify procedures for incorporating, on receipt of a complaint or allegation, all relevant records into a file to record all action taken.” For registered providers, “records of these should be available to service commissioners and the CQC so they can take the necessary action.” Regulation 17(2)(c) of the 2014 Regulations requires systems that enable the provider to “maintain securely an accurate, complete and contemporaneous record in respect of each service user”, including “decisions taken in relation to the care and treatment provided”. For a section 42 enquiry, the file should hold:

• The concern as first raised: who noticed it, when, and in what words. Paragraph 14.77: “the professional concerned should record the concern, the adult’s views, wishes, and any immediate action has taken and the reasons for those actions.” Our safeguarding concern form guide covers that first record.
• The immediate action and why. “Where the source of abuse or neglect is a member of staff it is for the employer to take immediate action and record what they have done and why” (paragraph 14.200).
• Who was told, and when: the manager, the local authority, the police, the family and the commissioner. An employer aware of abuse or neglect must “inform the local authority, CQC and CCG where the latter is the commissioner” (paragraph 14.69); CCGs have since been replaced by integrated care boards under the Health and Care Act 2022. A safeguarding chronology shows it.
• The CQC notification, sent “without delay” under Regulation 18, with the “ENQ reference number, notification ID, or case ID” CQC’s allegations of abuse (safeguarding) notification form page says you will receive. An incident “reported to, or investigated by, the police” is a separate notification. Our CQC notifications guide has the full list.
• Facts, kept apart from opinion. Staff must keep “accurate records, stating what the facts are and what are the known opinions of professionals and others and differentiating between fact and opinion” (paragraph 14.103).
• The adult’s views and desired outcomes. “It is vital that the views of the adult are sought and recorded. These should include the outcomes that the adult wants” (paragraph 14.103), such as feeling safe at home or pursuing the matter through the criminal justice system.
• The findings, the outcome sent to the local authority, its response, and the changes made.
• The candour record, where it applies. If the same events are a notifiable safety incident, Regulation 20 requires the notification to “be recorded in a written record which is kept securely by the registered person”; see our duty of candour guide.

Safeguarding adults reviews. The file may be read again long after the enquiry closes. Under section 44 of the Care Act 2014, a Safeguarding Adults Board must arrange a review where “there is reasonable cause for concern about how the SAB, members of it or other persons with relevant functions worked together to safeguard the adult” and either the adult has died and the board “knows or suspects that the death resulted from abuse or neglect”, or the adult is alive and the board “knows or suspects that the adult has experienced serious abuse or neglect”. Under section 45, a person the board asks for information “must comply with the request” where the section’s conditions are met. A review’s purpose “is not to hold any individual or organisation to account” (paragraph 14.168); it is “identifying the lessons to be learnt from the adult’s case” and “applying those lessons to future cases” (section 44(5)). And paragraph 14.185: “If someone knows that abuse or neglect is happening they must act upon that knowledge, not wait to be asked for information.”

The concern that arrives before the enquiry does

Most section 42 enquiries in a care service begin with a message rather than a form. A home care worker texts the office from her car that the client’s purse was empty again. A night senior messages the registered manager at four in the morning about a bruise that was not in yesterday’s notes. The deputy asks in the staff group chat whether anyone else has noticed anything. Each of those is the concern as first raised, and paragraph 14.77 asks for it to be recorded “Whatever the course of subsequent action”.

When the enquiry asks when the service first knew, who knew and what was done, the honest answer is often on personal phones belonging to people who were not thinking about an enquiry when they typed, some of whom have since left. Those messages are hard to bring into the file paragraph 14.180 describes, because they sit in apps the provider does not run on handsets it does not own. The missing messages would often have helped the provider: they are where staff noticed early, escalated and chased.

The answer is not to stop staff telling each other what they saw; that is the culture every enquiry hopes to find. It is to give those first tellings somewhere the service holds. ComplyChat provides a channel for work conversations, with everyone added told that it is on the record, and a mobile number verified by SMS is an identity on it, which matters where bank and agency staff rarely have a work account and families have none. Messages are recorded on the server as they are sent, and on paid plans the lasting record files into the provider’s own Microsoft 365 once the tenant is connected, under its own retention rules. ComplyChat is not a case management or care planning system and does not do rostering; it does not make a safeguarding referral, submit a CQC notification or decide whether the section 42 criteria are met, and a message is not a referral: the local multi-agency procedures still apply. ComplyChat Free is personal messaging with one private group, direct messages and three calendar months of recent history, with no Microsoft 365 archive or Replay; upgrading cannot restore expired history.

A question for the next managers’ or board meeting: for the last three safeguarding concerns the service raised with the local authority, could you produce the message in which each was first reported, with its time and its words – and if a section 42 enquiry asked for them tomorrow, where would you look?

Official guidance and your next step

The primary sources are sections 42, 44 and 45 of the Care Act 2014; chapter 14 of the Care and support statutory guidance, especially paragraphs 14.76 to 14.111 on enquiries and 14.180 to 14.186 on records and information sharing; Regulations 13, 17 and 20 of the 2014 Regulations and Regulation 18 of the 2009 Registration Regulations; and CQC’s guidance on Regulation 13 and its safeguarding quality statement for providers. Your local Safeguarding Adults Board’s multi-agency procedures set the referral route, the enquiry template and the timescales. Quotations are from those documents as published on 26 September 2026.

This guide is for adult social care providers and charities in England; Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland have their own legislation. It is a practical starting point, not legal advice about an individual case, and it does not replace your local procedures or the local authority safeguarding team’s advice.

Then do one thing: take the most recent safeguarding concern your service referred, and check that its file holds the first report in the words it was made, the immediate action and why, who was told and when, the CQC reference, the adult’s own words about what they wanted, and the outcome. Whatever is missing is what the next enquiry will ask for.