Each year, we ask services to complete an annual return. This gives us important information that helps us plan, inform and carry out our inspections and improvement work. We also share some of the information with other organisations, such as the Scottish Social Services Council and the Scottish Government, and we use it to produce several statistical publications that you can view on our website.

The data we gather helps us target our improvement activity and support within social care. It is a valuable source of baseline data across a variety of health and wellbeing indicators which we use to identify, drive and track improvement, for example infection control, nutrition and the recruitment and retention of staff. The data helps us to identify trends and topics by both geographical area or service type, so that we can see where best to focus our improvement support work, for example, improvement workshops or new resources and guidance for care services across the sector.

Annual returns open online at eforms.careinspectorate.com on 9 January 2023 and will close on 19 February 2023.

Our website careinspectorate.com has important information about the annual returns and answers to frequently asked questions under 'Annual returns' in the 'Professionals' section (https://www.careinspectorate.com/index.php/annual-returns). If an answer to a question can't be found there, services can call the Care Inspectorate's contact centre on 0345 600 9527.

All services registered before 1 October 2022 must complete an annual return. If your service registered on or after 1 October 2022, you should still try to complete an annual return this year. Although it's not mandatory, we will still be able to use any information supplied. The information you put in will automatically appear in the next annual return and you will then only need to enter any information that has changed.

Please note that even if a service is inactive, they must submit an annual return.

Services can log into their Care Inspectorate eForms account from any computer connected to the internet. If they need help accessing their annual return, they can call the Care Inspectorate's contact centre on 0345 600 9527.