Registration 20A
The provision under the Health and Social Care Act 2008 that legally requires providers to display their CQC rating.
Section 20A refers to Section 20A of the Health and Social Care Act 2008, which legally requires all CQC-registered care providers in England to display their CQC rating. The requirement applies to the registered premises (the physical care home or office) and to the provider's website. The CQC publishes specific guidance on how the rating must be displayed: it must be prominently shown, include the rating graphic, and link to the CQC report on the CQC website.
Non-compliance with Section 20A is a regulatory breach that CQC can take action on. Providers who fail to display their rating, display it without the required link, or display an outdated rating (following a re-inspection that produced a different outcome) are in breach. CQC has published enforcement decisions against providers for non-compliance with this requirement.
For a care home website, Section 20A compliance means the CQC rating graphic should appear on the homepage (typically in the footer) and on any page that mentions the rating. The link from the graphic must point to the provider's specific page on the CQC website, not to the CQC homepage. When a new inspection report is published and the rating changes, the website must be updated promptly.
Beyond compliance, displaying the CQC rating prominently is good commercial practice. Families searching for care use the CQC rating as a primary trust signal. A Good or Outstanding rating displayed clearly, with the inspection date visible and the link to the full report accessible, signals regulatory transparency. Schema markup that communicates the rating in structured data to Google extends this signal to search results.