A letter from the Health and Care Professions Council tells you that someone has raised a concern about you. It makes no difference whether you are a paramedic, a physiotherapist or a radiographer. You have entered a process that grew sharply last year. The HCPC's fitness to practise annual report for 2025-26 came out on 15 October 2026. It records 3,106 concerns, against 2,409 the year before. Paramedics drew the most, followed by practitioner psychologists and physiotherapists. Even so, only 0.7% of registrants faced a concern. The same report shows where cases end. Of the 1,826 cases the HCPC concluded in the year, 1,594 closed before any final hearing.

The threshold comes first

Triage checks that the concern falls within the HCPC's remit. If it does, the HCPC carries out an initial investigation and then applies its threshold policy. The current version is dated 7 July 2025. The test is whether the concern and the evidence amount to an allegation that your fitness to practise may be impaired. That allegation must rest on a ground in article 22 of the Health Professions Order 2001. The grounds include misconduct, lack of competence, a conviction or caution, your health and a finding by another regulator. The HCPC weighs the risk to the public and whether the matter stands alone or forms a pattern. It also asks whether you have taken steps to remediate your practice. In 2025-26 it closed 771 cases at this stage, against 591 the year before.

On remediation the policy is direct. Your retraining or supervised practice may show that the improvement has become part of how you work. If so, the HCPC may decide that you no longer present a risk and that the concern falls below the threshold. A concern that posed a potentially serious risk to patient safety may still go forward in the public interest. Timing decides who reads your evidence. The HCPC assesses evidence that arrives during the initial investigation against the threshold. Send the same evidence after referral and a panel weighs it instead.

Referral is final. The policy says a case that has reached the Investigating Committee cannot return to the threshold stage. Once it is there, only a no case to answer decision closes it. The one exception is the rare case where the HCPC loses jurisdiction. Serious concerns, such as serious violence, sexual offences or serious or sustained dishonesty, go straight to the Committee from triage. So does any case in which the HCPC decides to apply for an interim order, whether or not a panel grants one. The annual report says the HCPC will start a review of the threshold policy during 2026-27. Check which version applies when it assesses your case.

The Investigating Committee Panel

Once a concern meets the threshold, the HCPC drafts the allegation and sends it to you with the information it holds. Rule 4 of the Investigating Committee procedure rules then gives you 28 days to respond in writing, and the day the HCPC sends the letter counts as day one. The HCPC says it can allow a further 28 days at most. After that you must apply in writing to the Investigating Committee. Its guidance on what an investigation involves says you do not have to respond. The HCPC will not give your response to the person who raised the concern, but it may ask that person questions arising from it. It cannot compel you to engage. Its standards do require you to co-operate with any investigation into your conduct or competence.

A panel of three then meets in private and reads the papers. It has a chair, a member of your profession and a lay member. The panel does not decide the facts. It asks whether there is a realistic prospect of proving the allegation at a final hearing. It can adjourn, find a case to answer or find no case to answer. In 2025-26 panels found a case to answer 295 times and no case to answer 291 times. They adjourned 76 cases. You cannot appeal the decision. The only challenge is judicial review, which you must start promptly and no later than three months after the decision. If a new concern arrives within three years, an earlier no case to answer decision can go back before the panel.

Interim orders and the hearing

The HCPC can apply for an interim order while it investigates. It says it tries to give you seven days' notice of the hearing. In 2025-26 panels considered 328 applications and granted 280, of which 215 were suspensions. Under article 31 an order lasts up to 18 months unless the court extends it. A panel must review it within six months and then within three months of each review. Our guide to interim orders tribunals deals with doctors, and much of its advice on preparation holds before an HCPC panel.

Your case may reach a final hearing. The HCPC's sanctions policy of 2 March 2026 then applies. It tells panels that remorse expressed in advance may carry more weight than remorse expressed at the hearing. It says a panel will not treat an apology as an admission of the facts or of current impairment. Panels should also keep in mind that neurodivergence or cultural differences may shape how you express insight. Our guide to insight and remediation draws on GMC and MPTS guidance, and its methods apply here too.

What to do this week

  1. Diarise any date for a reply that the HCPC's letter sets. If the letter carries the allegation, count 28 days with the day the HCPC sent it as day one. Ask in writing for more time before they end.
  2. Tell your union, professional body or indemnity provider, and ask what your cover includes.
  3. Keep every record as it stands, and make no contact with the person who raised the concern.
  4. Begin remediation aimed at the concern, such as training or supervised practice, and keep the certificates and supervisor reports.
  5. Take advice before you send anything to the HCPC. Your evidence should arrive while the case can still close at the threshold.

Eloquia acts for every profession the HCPC regulates, and our HCPC page sets out each stage. Once we have read your papers, we quote a fixed fee for each stage before it starts, stated plus VAT. Every Eloquia fee includes a specialist barrister, and we fix the total for each stage. We quote expert fees separately, and our fees and funding page explains how staged payment works.

Sources

  1. HCPC fitness to practise annual report 2025-26, published 15 October 2026 (HCPC)
  2. Threshold policy for fitness to practise investigations, 7 July 2025 (HCPC)
  3. What our investigation would involve (HCPC)
  4. The Investigating Committee (HCPC)
  5. Interim orders (HCPC)
  6. Sanctions policy, 2 March 2026 (HCPC)
  7. Health Professions Order 2001, article 22 (allegations)
  8. Health Professions Order 2001, article 31 (interim orders)
  9. Health Professions Council (Investigating Committee) (Procedure) Rules 2003, rule 4, as made