How Bramble Court cut agency costs by 28% in 90 days
A 3-home independent operator replaced four agencies and three spreadsheets with Salstead. £52,000 saved in the first quarter and a CQC outstanding for well-led at the lead home.
“For the first time in 18 years of running care homes I can answer the CQC inspector's question before she finishes asking it. The agency bills used to keep me up at night. Now I sleep.”
Anonymised - Director of OperationsBramble Court Care Group
What changed
Where Bramble Court Care Group started
- 01Agency spend had reached £180,000 per quarter across three sites, with hidden margins of 40-55% on every booking.
- 02Compliance evidence lived in 14 separate folders, paper files at each home, and three different inboxes. The 2024 CQC inspection found gaps that took six weeks to remediate.
- 03Care plans were paper-based. Senior carers spent 90 minutes per shift writing notes that no one read. Family complaints about visibility were up 35% year on year.
- 04Holiday pay was being calculated manually. Two HMRC compliance warnings had been issued in 18 months.
“The first time the inspector asked for our staffing rota, I just turned the screen around. She said it was the cleanest evidence she had seen in eight years of inspections.”
Registered Manager, Lead Home
How Salstead rolled out
- 01Salstead rolled out across all three homes in 6 weeks. The Migration Assistant pulled across worker compliance records from the previous spreadsheets in 48 hours.
- 02All agency bookings moved into the Salstead marketplace. Workers were re-onboarded under PAYE with full DBS, RTW and training verified.
- 03Care plans, eMAR, body maps and incident reporting moved to Salstead mobile within the first 30 days.
- 04CQC evidence packs auto-build from live data. Bramble Court now opens a Reg 18 pack in 5 seconds instead of 5 days.
“Our senior carers got their evenings back. That alone saved us two resignations we did not see coming.”
HR Lead, Bramble Court
Bramble Court now operates as a reference customer for Salstead, hosting other operators for site visits. The group is expanding from 3 sites to 5 in 2026 and will run on Salstead from day one.
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