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Telecare and the Digital Switchover: Guidance for Housing Providers

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The Department of Health and Social Care have published new guidance for housing providers in England on telecare and the digital switchover in support of the National Telecare Action Plan. It sets out the essential steps organisations should take to help safeguard telecare users during the digital phone switchover by the end of January 2027, including information on data sharing, fire safety considerations and options for upgrading analogue telecare systems. This includes:

Housing providers and grouped living scheme telecare providers should:

  • ensure they have shared information with communication providers to enable communication providers to identify the phonelines which are used by telecare devices (this includes both grouped living scheme telecare and personal telecare). Without information sharing by housing providers, communication providers may not be aware that these lines are used for telecare and so telecare devices could be disconnected when lines are migrated, putting individuals at risk. Where telecare uses a broadband connection, they should also ensure the communication provider is aware. See data sharing section below for more information
  • identify all telecare equipment in use, assess whether it can communicate digitally, and determine any connected systems such as door entry or fire alarms, as well as peripheral devices like pendants or sensors
  • establish and assess the impact on the fire strategy and fire risk assessment for the premises. See fire safety section for more information
  • monitor call failure rates and test equipment regularly, ideally in cooperation with ARCs. Where upgrades are phased, these failure rates, combined with assessments of user needs, can help prioritise which alarms to upgrade first
  • for grouped living scheme alarms, understand the communication provider’s plans and timelines for migrating the telecare phonelines to digital and the process for your telecare alarm. The grouped living scheme system may need reconnecting to the new digital line and this could require a visit from the telecare service engineer
  • upgrade to a solution which enables reliable telecare on digital lines. Government assumes telecare service providers will deliver this through moving to a digital ARC and a fully digital alarm. Allow sufficient time and resource for testing, particularly to ensure devices work with the necessary connected systems (including fire panels and door entry if relevant) and alarm calls connect to the ARC as expected. Continue to monitor the solution to ensure it operates reliably
  • if your residents might have telecare which has not been provided through their housing provider (for example through a private telecare provider), inform residents that they need to tell their communication provider that they use telecare, to enable their communication provider to put extra support in place when their line is migrated
  • involve residents in co-designing solutions to ensure these meet their needs and continue to keep residents updated about the switchover, the impact on services and what actions are being taken
  • consider sharing plans and risk registers with local authorities and communication providers, to highlight potential threats to telecare such as connectivity issues or delayed equipment replacement
  • understand how their telecare solution could be impacted by power cuts and implement mitigations

With reference to the work of the Housing LIN and citing the TAPPI principles, the guidance highlights that many housing providers still operate analogue telecare and warden call systems. If these systems are not upgraded, telecare services may become unreliable or stop working when phone lines are migrated, potentially putting residents who rely on telecare at risk.

This is also backed up in a latest ‘State of the Nation’ report on AI and its impact on specialist and supported housing, which highlights how the sector has been slow to adopt AI and still not wholly “digi-ready”.

In summary, the guidance:

  • provides specific information for housing providers and other organisations with grouped living scheme telecare, including local authorities
  • includes a list of essential steps for housing providers to take to safeguard telecare users
  • sets out some of the options for replacing grouped living scheme telecare, highlighting some advantages and disadvantages of each
  • includes case studies by several Housing LIN members to demonstrate the technical solutions and broader steps available to housing providers to respond to the risk created by the digital phone switchover

If you found this of interest, check out Jeremy Porteus’ recent Housing LIN blog.

And if you’d like to learn more about the next phase of TAPPI and the £3million SHAPE Challenge Fund, this exciting 5-year programme is being launched at our HAPPI Hour webinar on Tuesday, 27 October 2026.