The rota can make sure only suitably qualified carers are scheduled for each person — and steer you towards familiar faces. This is set per supported person in the area's Rota settings.
Required skills and certificates
On the Required competencies card you choose the skills and certificates a carer must hold to support this person. Enforcement is controlled by two settings: Require staff to match the shift's skills and Require staff to have valid certificates. When these are on, a carer who's missing a required competency — or whose certificate has expired — can't be assigned, can't claim an open shift, and can't be swapped onto that person's shifts.
When you try to assign someone who falls short, the Add shift window shows exactly what's wrong — for example which competencies are Missing or Expired — and the assignment is blocked. If the requirement is switched off, you'll see the same information as an amber warning instead, but you can still go ahead.
Preferred carers
Add Preferred carers for continuity of care. They aren't forced onto shifts, but they're surfaced first when cover is advertised and flagged with a green banner in the builder, so it's easy to keep the same trusted faces around someone.
Excluded carers
Excluded carers are a hard block. An excluded carer can't be assigned, can't clock in, can't pick up cover and can't be swapped onto that person's shifts. Saving the exclusion also pulls them off any upcoming shifts for that person, which then become open for cover. Use this for safeguarding or a documented incompatibility. If a carer is in both lists, excluded always wins.
- 1Open the area's **Rota** tab, then go to **Settings**.
- 2Turn on **Require staff to match the shift's skills** and/or **Require staff to have valid certificates** (or leave them on the organisation default).
- 3Under **Required competencies**, tick the skills and certificates a carer must hold for this person.
- 4Use the **Preferred & excluded carers** card to add familiar faces and anyone who must never be scheduled.
- 5Click **Save settings**.
- Skills and certificates come from the organisation's catalogue — set those up in Settings first if the list is empty.
- Preferred is a nudge, excluded is a barrier: use preferred to guide choices and excluded only where someone must never be scheduled.