CQC Compliance Software Compared (2026): Prices, Features and How to Choose
What CQC compliance software and management systems are, how the main types differ, what the leading options say they cover, what is published about price, and how to choose for your service.
CQC compliance software helps a care provider manage the audits, actions, evidence, policies and governance records that show it meets CQC requirements. It is different from a care management system, which runs care plans, medicines records and rotas. Published prices for the products that publish them run from about £49 to £179 a month for a single service, and several leading vendors publish no price at all. CQC does not approve or endorse any software, so choose on fit to your service, not a badge.
Search for “CQC compliance software” and you will find vendor product pages, care management platforms, free audit templates and buyer guides all mixed together, which makes it hard to compare like with like. This guide separates the four main types of tool, sets out what well-known options say they cover (from their own websites, read on 24 October 2026), puts the published prices side by side, lists the free alternatives and gives a checklist for choosing. We are a vendor ourselves, so we say plainly where CQCLogic fits and where it does not, and we do not rank other products.
Key takeaways
- “CQC compliance software” and “care management system” are different jobs. Most well-run services use both.
- There are four types of tool: templates and spreadsheets, policy and guidance libraries, compliance and audit platforms, and care management systems.
- Prices are rarely published. Where they are, single-service subscriptions run from about £49 to £179 a month, plus any one-time fee (see the price table). QCS, Radar and Access publish none.
- CQC does not endorse or approve software. Judge a product by whether it helps you evidence your own practice.
- What matters most: audits that create tracked actions, evidence stored against those actions, and reports you can show an inspector.
- A spreadsheet is enough for a small service until actions are missed, evidence is scattered or you have several services.
In this guide
- What Is CQC Compliance Software?
- Do You Need Software, or Are Spreadsheets Enough?
- Compliance Software vs Care Management Software
- CQC Compliance Software Options: What They Say They Cover
- What Does CQC Compliance Software Cost? Published Prices
- What Each Product’s Website Lists
- Care Management Systems Often Confused With Compliance Software
- Free and Low-Cost Alternatives
- What to Look For: A Checklist to Use With Any Vendor
- What Has Replaced KLOEs, and Does It Affect Software?
- Does CQC Approve or Certify Software?
- Where CQCLogic Fits
- Which Type of Tool Suits Your Situation?
- Sources and how this was checked
- Frequently asked questions
What Is CQC Compliance Software?
CQC compliance software is a system for managing the records and routines that show a service is safe, effective, caring, responsive and well-led: audit schedules and findings, action plans with owners and dates, evidence, policy review, incident, complaint and safeguarding records, training and governance meetings. Its job is to help you prove, and improve, quality against the standards CQC assesses, not to deliver the care itself. Some vendors call it a “compliance management system” or “quality management system”.
There are four broad types of tool, and products often blend them:
| Type | What it does | Typical limit |
|---|---|---|
| Templates and spreadsheets | Audit checklists, evidence trackers, action logs in Word, Excel or a shared drive | Nothing connects them, so a finding does not automatically become a tracked action and nothing chases overdue items |
| Policy and guidance libraries | Ready-written policies, update alerts and staff read-and-sign tracking | Tells you what policies to have, not whether practice matches them |
| Compliance and audit platforms | Audits, mock inspections, actions, evidence and dashboards in one system | Usually sit alongside, not instead of, your care records |
| Care management systems | Digital care plans, medicines administration, rotas, daily notes, family portals | Produce good evidence but are not built to structure an improvement response to an inspection finding |
Do You Need Software, or Are Spreadsheets Enough?
For a very small service, a spreadsheet and a shared drive can do the job. They stop working when any of these is true:
- Actions are missed or nobody can say who owns them or when they are due.
- Evidence is scattered across drives, emails and paper, and takes a day to pull together.
- You have more than one service or site and need to see them separately and together.
- You are responding to a poor rating, a warning notice or an expected assessment, and need to show progress over time.
- Policies are numerous enough that review dates slip.
Before paying for anything, try the free options below on a real audit. If it works, stay put; if not, you have a clear list of what the software must fix.
Compliance Software vs Care Management Software
A care management system tells staff what to do for each person today. Compliance software tells you, and if it comes to it an inspector, whether what is happening can be evidenced against the standard CQC expects. A care management system on its own does not organise your response to a CQC finding, and a compliance tool on its own does not run your rota or record medicines. Some vendors sell both as one suite, and some care platforms include audit modules, so check what is included. For a fuller explanation see care home compliance software: what it does and how to choose.
CQC Compliance Software Options: What They Say They Cover
The table summarises what each product says about itself on its own website (read 24 October 2026). It is not a ranking or a test, and we have not used these products. Features, plans and prices change, so confirm with each vendor.
| Product | Type | What its website says it covers | Regulators and settings |
|---|---|---|---|
| QCS Compliance Centre | Policy and compliance library | 340+ policies and procedures, tracking of regulatory updates, automatic policy updates, customised policy uploads, tailored reading lists, a care home CQC compliance checklist, audit trail. Links to separate QCS audit, learning and mock inspection products | CQC, Care Inspectorate (Scotland), CIW (Wales), RQIA (Northern Ireland). Care homes, home care, supported living, clinics |
| Access Care Compliance (The Access Group) | Compliance and audit platform | Audit tool, mock inspections, online action plans, surveys, risk and assurance register, mobile app, AI features | Care providers. Prices are an annual cost per carer or per bed; price matching offered |
| Radar Healthcare | Compliance platform | Analytics and reporting, action and improvement plans and notices (included as standard); incident, audit, document, risk and workforce modules (add-ons); dashboards aligned to quality statements; feedback collation; mock inspections | Care homes, care groups, NHS, primary care, dentistry and others |
| Care Audit Tool | Audit and action tracking | 100 ready-made audits and 3,000+ questions, scheduled or on-demand audits, instant compliance rating, actions assigned to staff, evidence uploads, surveys, reports | Care homes and home care |
| InspectReady | Free tools plus platform | Policy register mapped to the assessment framework, audit scheduler with action tracking, guided evidence-pack export, readiness coverage view, reminders, version history; free tools | Care homes (single home or 2 to 5 homes) |
| Crysp | Compliance management and reporting | Centralised documentation, reminders, real-time compliance status and reporting | Describes itself as for clinics and practices rather than care homes |
| Medflow Assure (Medflow Dynamics) | Purpose-built compliance platform | Assessment framework and 34 quality statements built in, readiness scoring, audit trail, policy review cycles, optional AI drafting | Written for GP practices and healthcare providers |
Beyond this list, providers use products from care management and HR vendors that include compliance modules, and other specialist tools. Use the checklist below, not a brand name, to shortlist.
What Does CQC Compliance Software Cost? Published Prices
Most vendors do not publish prices, so the table below lists what is published, with the date we read it. VAT treatment differs by vendor, so check it.
| Product | Published price | What the price covers | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| InspectReady | £49 a month (single home). £99 a month (2 to 5 homes) | Whole team included, no per-user charge. 14-day free trial, no card required. Evidence packs stay downloadable for 30 days after cancellation | inspectready.co.uk/pricing |
| Care Audit Tool | £75 a month (home care, one registered entity). £150 a month (care home, one registered entity) | Price is per registered or legal entity, not per location. No free trial offered | careaudittool.co.uk |
| Medflow Assure | From £600 a year (Essential tier). Says purpose-built tools typically cost £600 to £1,500 per practice per year | Single-site practices; AI features cost extra. Aimed at GP practices | medflowdynamics.co.uk |
| Access Care Compliance | No amounts published. Annual cost per carer or per bed | Quote only; price matching offered | theaccessgroup.com |
| QCS | Not published | Demo and quote | qcs.co.uk |
| Radar Healthcare | Not published | Demo and quote (“get pricing” form) | radarhealthcare.com |
| CQCLogic | Free Insight plan. From £119 a month plus a £239 one-time plan (Requires Improvement or Good rating). £179 a month plus a £349 one-time plan (Inadequate rating). Prices include VAT | Price depends on your latest CQC rating. Insight: top 3 actions and rating analysis. One-time plan: framework-mapped improvement plan (23+ actions), re-inspection planning window and inspection history. Monthly: task assignment, evidence pack, notification tracker, incident management, mock inspection question bank and readiness score. One CQC-registered location per plan; group pricing from 3 locations. See what is and is not included below | cqclogic.co.uk/pricing |
Read this table with care: the published subscriptions are for different scopes. InspectReady and Care Audit Tool are narrower audit, policy and evidence products; QCS is a policy library; CQCLogic is built around turning a CQC report into an improvement plan and tracking it. Compare what each includes, not only the monthly figure, and run a pilot on a real audit or action list. CQCLogic’s monthly price is higher than the audit-only products because it includes the improvement plan, task tracking and evidence pack, and its one-time plan fee depends on your rating.
What Each Product’s Website Lists
Price is only half of the comparison. This table shows what each product’s own pages list for seven things buyers ask about (read 24 October 2026). “Not listed” means we did not find it on the pages we read, not that the product cannot do it, so ask each vendor. Including CQCLogic, and including where CQCLogic does not list something, is deliberate.
| Product | Audits and action tracking | Evidence storage or pack | Mock inspection | Policies | Incident management | Improvement plan built from your CQC report | Free plan or trial |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| QCS Compliance Centre | Separate QCS Audit Centre product | Audit trail, document uploads | Separate QCS Mock Inspections product | 340+ supplied and auto-updated | Not listed | Not listed | Demo only |
| Access Care Compliance | Audit tool and online action plans | Not listed | Listed | Expert guidance built in | Not listed | Not listed | Demo only |
| Radar Healthcare | Action plans included; audit management is an add-on | Central evidence; document management add-on | Listed in FAQ | Policy portal and document management add-on | Add-on module | Not listed | Demo only |
| Care Audit Tool | Listed: 100 audits, scheduling, actions | Evidence uploads on actions | Not listed | Not listed | Not listed | Not listed | No free trial |
| InspectReady | Audit scheduler and action tracking | Guided evidence-pack export | Not listed (readiness coverage view) | Policy register mapped to the framework | Not listed | Not listed | 14-day trial and free tools |
| CQCLogic | Audit schedule with 12 pre-loaded audits; task assignment with deadlines | Inspector evidence pack and uploads | Mock inspection question bank (it does not run mock inspections) | Register of policies and review dates (does not supply policies) | Incident management module | Listed: framework-mapped plan of 23+ actions from your report | Free Insight plan |
CQCLogic also lists a re-inspection planning window, an inspection history timeline and a CQC notification tracker (it tracks notifications and does not submit them); we did not see these listed on the other pages. Where others lead: QCS supplies and updates 340+ policies and covers four UK regulators, which CQCLogic does not; Radar and Access offer deeper analytics and surveys; and CQCLogic’s modules are separate registers rather than one integrated quality management system.
Care Management Systems Often Confused With Compliance Software
These platforms run day-to-day care records that inspectors can review as evidence. They are usually not built to structure a response to an inspection finding, although some include audit features: Nourish Care (digital care planning), Person Centred Software (mobile care recording and medicines management), Log My Care (care planning and daily logs for smaller providers), CoolCare (care management with occupancy and finance tools), Access Care Management (part of the wider Access suite) and Birdie (built mainly for home care). We give general descriptions only, so verify current features and pricing with each provider.
Free and Low-Cost Alternatives
A very small service can meet many needs with free tools:
- CQC’s own assessment framework pages set out the five key questions and quality statements you are assessed against.
- Skills for Care’s inspection toolkit includes exercises, examples and resources.
- Our free CQC audit pack (12 audits with scoring, a schedule and an action log) and mock inspection template (all 34 quality statements).
- Free vendor tools, such as InspectReady’s readiness self-assessment and audit scheduler, and Safe Workplace’s free home care audit tool.
- Your own templates; see our care home audit schedule template and required policies list.
The trade-off is that nothing links the pieces, so overdue actions and missing evidence are easy to miss.
What to Look For: A Checklist to Use With Any Vendor
| Look for | Ask the vendor |
|---|---|
| Audits that create actions | When an audit finds a gap, does it become a tracked action with an owner and date automatically? |
| Evidence against each action | Can staff attach evidence and can you show it to an inspector? |
| Fit to CQC’s framework | How does it map to the five key questions and quality statements, and how will it handle CQC’s planned framework changes? See software and the assessment framework |
| Governance records | Does it cover meetings, minutes and actions, and incident, complaint and safeguarding records? |
| Policy management | Does it hold and review policies, or supply and update them, or both? |
| Reporting | Can you export a report that shows progress over time? |
| Service type and regulator | Is it built for your setting and your regulator? Care homes and home care differ. See care home vs domiciliary compliance software |
| Multiple sites | Can you see each location separately and together? |
| Data protection | Where is data held, who can access it and can you export it if you leave? |
| Cost and contract | What is included, what costs extra, how long is the contract and what happens to your evidence if you cancel? |
Run a short pilot with your own audit or a real action list before committing. Ask how long set-up takes and what you must do yourself; vendors give very different answers, and a 14-day trial is a useful test.
What Has Replaced KLOEs, and Does It Affect Software?
CQC’s single assessment framework replaced the old key lines of enquiry (KLOEs) with 34 quality statements under the same five key questions. CQC has since published draft sector frameworks for 2026 that would replace quality statements with key lines of enquiry again and remove scoring. They are not in force and CQC says current guidance applies until they are, so check that any tool you buy can follow either; see CQC’s new assessment framework for 2026 for what has been confirmed and what has not. A tool that organises evidence by key question and regulation works under both.
Does CQC Approve or Certify Software?
No. CQC does not endorse or approve particular products, so claims of “CQC approved” or “CQC compliant” software describe the vendor’s own view. Judge a product by whether it helps you evidence your own practice and meet the regulations, particularly good governance. See CQC approved software: what it really means.
Where CQCLogic Fits
CQCLogic is a compliance tool, not a care management system. It starts from your CQC report: find your service by name or postcode (or enter your Location ID), or upload the report to get an improvement plan, then use the modules to run the routine that keeps quality up. Those include an audit schedule with 12 pre-loaded audits, a governance meeting manager, task assignment with deadlines and evidence uploads, a policy register, a notification tracker and logs for incidents, complaints, safeguarding, medication errors, DoLS and MCA, supervision and training.
What it is not: it does not replace care planning or electronic medication records, so most services use it alongside their care system. Its policy library is a register of your policies and review dates, not a policy editor or a supplied policy set, and its modules are separate registers rather than one fully integrated quality management system. If you mainly need ready-written policies or care planning, another type of tool in the table above may fit better. On price, its monthly subscription is higher than the published audit-and-evidence products above, because it includes the improvement plan, task tracking, evidence pack and notification tools; compare scope, not only the monthly figure.
Which Type of Tool Suits Your Situation?
| Your situation | Start with |
|---|---|
| Small service, few actions, tight budget | Free tools and templates, then move on when actions outgrow spreadsheets |
| Need ready-written, regularly updated policies | A policy and guidance library |
| Dealing with a Requires Improvement or Inadequate finding | A compliance tool that turns findings into tracked actions. See how to write a CQC improvement plan |
| Mainly want audits scheduled and actions chased | An audit and action tracking product, or our free audit pack to start |
| No digital care records yet | A care management system first, then add compliance tracking |
| CQC consultant or adviser managing several clients | See software for CQC consultants |
Sources and how this was checked
- Vendor pages read on 24 October 2026: QCS, Radar Healthcare, Access Care Compliance, Care Audit Tool, InspectReady pricing, Crysp and Medflow Dynamics.
- CQC: Assessment framework.
- Skills for Care: Inspection toolkit.
Features and prices are as the vendors state them, change often and are not tested by us. We do not rank products and have no commercial relationship with the vendors listed.
See what a tracked improvement plan looks like
CQCLogic starts from your CQC report and turns it into a framework-mapped improvement plan with owners, deadlines and evidence. You can start free; it tracks your work and does not submit anything to CQC. See a sample improvement plan, view pricing or get started free.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is CQC compliance software?
Software that helps a care provider manage the audits, actions, evidence, policies and governance records that show it meets CQC requirements. It focuses on proving and improving quality rather than delivering day-to-day care.
What is the best CQC compliance software?
It depends on your service. Home care, care homes, GP practices and clinics have different needs, and a product that suits a large group may be more than a small service needs. Use the checklist and run a pilot rather than relying on rankings.
How much does CQC compliance software cost?
Few vendors publish prices. Those that do show single-service subscriptions from about £49 a month (InspectReady, single home) and £75 to £150 a month (Care Audit Tool), to £119 a month for CQCLogic (£179 for Inadequate-rated services), each with a one-time improvement plan fee of £239 (£349 for Inadequate). In the first year for one service that is about £588 for InspectReady (single home), £900 to £1,800 for Care Audit Tool and £1,667 for CQCLogic (£2,497 if rated Inadequate), because CQCLogic’s price includes the improvement plan. QCS, Radar and Access publish no amounts. Ask for a written quote showing what is included, what costs extra and the contract length.
What is the best QMS software for a care provider?
A quality management system for care normally means audits, actions, evidence, policies and governance in one place. There is no single best product: shortlist on whether audits create tracked actions, whether evidence is stored against them, how policies are managed and whether it suits your service type and regulator.
What is the best compliance management platform in 2026?
No independent test ranks them, and CQC does not approve any. Compare the products in this guide on the checklist, check what each includes, and pilot one on a real audit or action list.
What has replaced KLOEs?
Quality statements, under CQC’s single assessment framework. CQC has published draft frameworks for 2026 that would bring key lines of enquiry back and remove scoring, but they are not in force. See our guide to the 2026 framework.
What is a CQC management system?
The phrase is used for two things: a compliance system that manages evidence, audits and actions, and a care management system that runs care plans, medicines records and rotas. Check which one a product actually is.
Is there CQC approved software?
No. CQC does not endorse or approve particular products, so “CQC approved” describes the vendor’s claim, not a CQC certification.
Is there free CQC compliance software?
There are free tools, such as audit templates, self-assessments, Skills for Care’s inspection toolkit and our free audit pack. They can suit a very small service but do not usually connect findings to tracked actions.
Can I use a spreadsheet instead of compliance software?
For a very small service, yes. A spreadsheet stops working when actions are missed, evidence is scattered, you have several sites or you need to show progress after a poor rating.
Do I need both a care management system and compliance software?
Often yes, because they do different jobs. The exception is where one vendor’s suite covers both well enough for your needs. Check what is included.