Invision360 EHCP Quality-Assurance Tool — Hertfordshire Tackles a 223% Rise in SEND Plans

Hertfordshire County Council manages more than 12,000 Education, Health and Care Plans (EHCPs) -- statutory documents setting out the educational, health and social-care support for children and young people with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND). Between 2015 and 2023, the number of children requiring an EHCP in Hertfordshire rose 223%, against a 140% national average increase and 115% among the council's statistical neighbours.

To keep pace with rising demand, Hertfordshire launched a service redesign, 'Making SEND Everyone's Business' (MSEB), creating specialist EHCP teams and a dedicated SEND quality-assurance function, and adopted the Invision360 AI grading tool to replace manual, checklist-and-spreadsheet-based quality checks with objective, real-time visibility into plan quality.

Invision360 automatically grades draft and completed EHCPs against defined criteria -- including whether outcomes in the plan's Section E meet SMART standards -- replacing a process that, according to Hertfordshire's SEND Quality Assurance Team Manager Rachael Kennedy, had become 'increasingly complicated to interpret the rationale behind individual judgements.'

According to Kennedy, the tool gives managers live, section-by-section grading and real-time progress tracking that previously required a full quarter of manual audit work to compile, letting the team identify specific weak areas -- such as under-specified social-care sections -- and target training through Hertfordshire's SEND Academy accordingly.

These are qualitative, self-reported benefits from a single named council official in a vendor-published case study; no independent audit or quantified before/after EHCP quality score has been published, and the account does not address false positives, appeals, or implementation costs.