For care providers
Looking at each person's week as a whole
Reading one person's visits as a whole week, against what was agreed with them. What guidance says about agreeing visit times with the person, timing visits around their day, and talking through any change to when visits are made.
Over time, one person's visits shift. A time is moved after a phone call, a visit is added for a while, another is taken off, and every change makes sense at the moment it is made, to whoever makes it. The practice below reads each person's visits as one week, against the agreement made with them. This is information, not legal advice.
Read the week against what was agreed
Ireland's Health Service Executive, in its home support specifications, describes the person and the provider each receiving the care plan and the schedule of services, and a copy being accessible where the person lives. That written schedule is what each person's week can be read back against.
What we don’t claim here
We don’t say what the rules require where your service operates, and we don’t set a standard of our own. Requirements differ from place to place, so we don’t imply one.
Who can weigh it: your service’s own policies, its regulator and professional advice where it operates. Where to take it →
Keep the visits to the times agreed with the person
Ireland's HSE specifications go on to describe the person, or their representative, and the provider agreeing visit times tailored to the person's needs and preferences, where visits do not have to happen at a set time. HIQA's review for Ireland says staff should be able to time their visits around the schedule of the person and their families. In focus groups reported in HIQA's full evidence review, older people receiving home care in England said unscheduled visits could affect their plans for the rest of the day.
In Canada, the Canadian Home Care Association's principles for home care include customizing care to the unique needs of the people receiving it and their families. In Ontario, Ontario Health atHome's statement of rights for the people it serves includes being dealt with in a way that recognizes each person's individuality and responds to their needs and preferences.
Agree any new visit time with the person
NICE's home care guideline for England recommends negotiating any change to someone's care with them, giving the timing of visits as one example. Planning visit routes across an area returns to that recommendation for visit times that travel planning could shift.
NICE's guideline on people's experience of adult social care in England recommends building flexibility into the care and support plan so that it can take in changes to a person's priorities, needs and preferences. HIQA's evidence review for home care standards in Ireland describes accountable providers using work schedules and models of care that allow flexibility in how care is delivered.
Settle the local arrangements where you operate
Nothing above reaches beyond Ireland (the HSE and HIQA), Canada (the Canadian Home Care Association, and Ontario Health atHome in Ontario) and England (NICE). How visit times are agreed, funded and changed is not decided here; those arrangements rest with your own policies, your regulator and professional advice where you operate.
When to ask a professional
This guide stops where your service’s own judgment starts. Take what fits back to its policies, its regulator and professional advice where it operates.
Sources
The outside sources this guide draws on.
Primary: Taken from the official source itself, and cited directly. Secondary: Established in recognised guidance, summarised here.
- PrimaryHSE (Ireland), Home Support Services: Services for Older People, Authorisation Scheme, Service Specifications, specification 7, Version 2.5, June 2026
- PrimaryNICE (England), People's experience in adult social care services (NG86), 20 February 2018
- PrimaryNICE (England), Home care: delivering personal care and practical support to older people living in their own homes (NG21), 17 September 2015 (updated March 2018)
- SecondaryHIQA (Ireland), Executive summary: Evidence review to inform the development of National Standards for Homecare and Support Services in Ireland, 2022
- SecondaryHIQA (Ireland), Evidence review to inform the development of the National Standards for Homecare and Support Services, 2022
- PrimaryOntario Health atHome (Canada, Ontario), Patient Bill of Rights, 04-2026
- PrimaryCanadian Home Care Association (Canada), Harmonized Principles for Home Care, June 2017
More in this department
How we source
Carefulness, made visible.
Named, not counted
Each guide names its sources and tags each one Primary or Secondary. It never counts sources at you.
Holding back
Where a part isn’t confirmed, a guide runs shorter and says what is missing.
Naming the limit
Every guide names where its authority ends, and who to ask instead.