When mum's care home rings: sharing the calls between brothers and sisters

Why the care home rings one person

In a 2021 decision, the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman looked at a complaint from a daughter who wasn't told when her father died in a care home. Staff had tried her, then reached her sister. The Ombudsman found no fault: there was no legal or other requirement for the home to contact more than one family member, and it accepted that care homes don't have the capacity to contact more than one relative.

So in practice, whoever is the home's main contact carries the whole family's news. If they're unreachable, or don't pass it on quickly, the rest of you hear late, or second-hand.

What usually goes wrong

• The main contact is at work, driving or abroad when the home rings, and the message sits in their voicemail.
• One sibling becomes the person who always hears first and has to ring everyone else, often with difficult news.
• Someone hears about a fall or a hospital admission days later and feels shut out.

How to share it

1. Agree a main contact and a back-up, and make sure the home has both on its records, with up-to-date numbers.
2. Ask the home what it will ring about: falls, a GP visit, a change in medication, a hospital admission. Then you all know what to expect.
3. Agree how news gets passed on, and how fast. A family group chat works for many people. Carers UK's Jointly app lets everyone in a "care circle" share messages, tasks, a calendar and medication notes, for a one-off £2.99 a circle.
4. Tell the home when the main contact is away, and who to try instead.
5. Save the home's number in everyone's phone, so it's recognised and isn't screened out as an unknown caller.

Where MyCirCall fits

MyCirCall gives the family one UK mobile number to put on the home's records. When the home rings it, every brother and sister in your CirCall rings at the same time, and the first to answer and press 5 takes the call. The home still makes one call, which is all it can manage, but it reaches whoever is free. On Essential and Peace of Mind, everyone else gets a text saying who took it.

MyCirCall is not an emergency service. In an emergency, always call 999 or 112.

Sources

• Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman, decision 21 004 861 (21 December 2021)
• Carers UK, Jointly app for carers

Sources checked on 16 October 2026. Each organisation's own guidance can change, so check with your school, care home or hospital for how they work.