1. Dashboard Overview
QR Scan Counter: total scans this month versus all time, with percentage change versus last month. This is your headline metric.
Top 5 Staff Leaderboard: your five highest-performing staff members by scan count this month, with percentage change versus last month. Rankings update automatically.
Forward the automated Monday morning leaderboard email to your entire team every week without fail.
2. Setting Up Your Staff
Go to the Staff page from the left navigation.
Click Add Staff Member and enter their name and role. Staff do not have individual logins. They can add their own profile via a one-time invite link generated from the Staff page.
Who to add and in what order:
Reception staff first, then HCAs, then pharmacy, then allied health professionals (PAs, ANPs, ACPs, APs), then nurses and GPs. This mirrors the order in which staff typically generate the highest scan volumes based on our pilot data.
Important: QR codes and links are only generated once a staff member has been assigned to a room. Adding a staff member alone is not enough. You must complete the room assignment step below before any QR codes or URLs are created.
3. Rooms
Go to the Rooms page from the left navigation.
Add each room in your practice: Room 1, Room 2, and so on.
Assigning staff to rooms: once a room is created, assign one or more staff members to it. Multiple staff can share the same room. When printing QR codes for a shared room, clearly label each printed code with the staff member's name.
Reception: reception staff are assigned to Room 0 by default. You can add them as a group under Room 0, or individually with arbitrary room numbers.
For departments with no fixed physical room (pharmacy, admin, home visit teams), create an arbitrarily numbered room purely to generate their QR code and URL. The room does not need to physically exist.
When a staff member leaves or moves rooms, reassign them on the dashboard in seconds. No reprinting required.
Once a staff member is assigned to a room, their unique QR code and URL are generated automatically and are ready to use.
For corridor and waiting area backup codes, go to the Settings page, toggle on rotation momentarily, download the QR codes for your preferred destination (particularly your FFT URL, which is our recommended primary fallback given its high CQC relevance) and print these directly as laminated A4 posters for corridor and exit door placement.
4. Settings Page
Practice Details
Fill in your practice name, ODS code, address, and postcode. For your Google Place ID, click Find my Place ID and it will be located and filled in automatically using your ODS code. Save your practice details before moving on.
Feedback Channel Rotation
This controls where your QR codes send patients when scanned.
By default, rotation is off and all traffic goes to your Google Reviews page. This is the recommended setting for your first three months.
To enable rotation, toggle Enable Smart Rotation on. A schedule appears with a dropdown for each day of the week (Monday to Sunday). For each day, select one of:
- Google Reviews
- Custom URL 1
- Custom URL 2
- Custom URL 3
- Custom URL 4
In the Custom URL fields below the schedule, paste any feedback URL: FFT, Healthwatch, Care Opinion, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, or any other platform. Each field also shows a QR code preview and download options (PNG and PDF) so you can print these directly for corridor and door placements.
If you have a CQC inspection approaching and want to demonstrate active feedback-seeking, you can add https://www.cqc.org.uk/give-feedback-on-care/start?id=GFOCPC as a Custom URL. CQC uses what patients tell them to understand the quality of care a service provides, alongside information from the service itself and what they found at their last visit.
Click Save Rotation Settings when done. QR codes update instantly. No reprinting ever required.
5. Placing Your QR Codes
Placement is critical. Follow these guidelines precisely:
- Print and laminate A4 QR code sheets for each staff member. Lamination protects them and ensures a professional appearance.
- Stick laminated A4 codes on the top left or right corner of consulting room doors at eye level. This keeps them above coat hangers, visible to patients on their way out, and easy for clinicians to point to during a consultation.
- Place a smaller printed card on the clinician's desk as a secondary reminder.
- Print A4 codes from your Custom URL fields in Settings, particularly your FFT URL, and place these on corridor walls and main entrance and exit doors as a backup for patients without Google accounts.
- Place QR codes in as many patient-visible locations as possible: waiting areas, notice boards, reception desk, and treatment room walls.
6. Finding and Sharing Staff URLs
Go to the Staff page, then navigate to the Rooms section. Next to each staff member and room, you will see a link icon. Click it to copy their unique URL instantly.
This URL never changes and never expires. Once copied, paste it into SMS templates, email footers, appointment reminder messages, or anywhere else your team contacts patients.
For reception and pharmacy teams who regularly send SMS or email to patients, embedding this URL into existing templates is one of the highest-yield strategies available and requires zero ongoing effort after the initial setup.
Example SMS template: "Hi [Name], thank you for visiting us today. We would love to hear your feedback: [URL]"
7. Feedback Channel Strategy
Months 1 to 3: Google Reviews only
Route all traffic to Google Reviews for the first three months. This rapidly builds your online reputation and boosts staff morale simultaneously as real patient compliments begin appearing publicly.
Why Google specifically: it is now the only public star rating that exists for a GP practice in England. The NHS website retired its own review and ratings function, CQC's Give Feedback on Care service is private and produces no public rating, and the GP Patient Survey publishes annually and a year in arrears. When a patient searches your practice name, Google is what they see.
After month 3: Enable Smart Rotation
Once your Google foundation is solid, diversify across FFT, Healthwatch, Care Opinion, and any social media platforms relevant to your practice.
If you have an inspection approaching, add CQC's Give Feedback on Care as one of your rotation days. CQC uses what patients tell them to understand the quality of care a service provides, alongside information from the service itself and what they found at their last visit.
For home visits and housebound patients, print physical FFT forms to take along. Elderly and non-tech-savvy patients are often the most grateful and most willing to complete a paper form when handed one in person.
8. Building a Culture of Feedback (Optional but Strongly Recommended)
Physical Wall of Love
Print your Google reviews and display them in your staff room or common area. Staff who see their name attached to a patient compliment in a physical space perform consistently better and feel more valued. This costs nothing and works better than most formal recognition schemes.
Read compliments aloud at weekly or monthly team meetings. Individual staff can print reviews directly from Google for their own portfolios and appraisal evidence.
Weekly Leaderboard Email
Every Monday morning you receive an automated email with total scan counts and your top 5 staff leaderboard. Forward it to the entire team every week.
9. CQC Alignment
Feedbacker maps directly to CQC's five key inspection domains. For practices with upcoming inspections or improvement plans, prioritise in this order:
- 1FFT responses with closed-loop follow-up actions documented (rated highly by CQC)
- 2Google Reviews (CQC inspectors may check these directly)
- 3CQC's own Give Feedback on Care service, at https://www.cqc.org.uk/give-feedback-on-care/start?id=GFOCPC. CQC uses what patients tell them to understand the quality of care a service provides, alongside information from the service itself and what they found at their last visit. Particularly relevant if you have an inspection approaching.
- 4Patient Participation Group meetings: bring printed Google reviews as tangible patient engagement evidence
- 5Healthwatch and Care Opinion submissions
Practices that engage consistently across these channels will have addressed the overwhelming majority of CQC patient experience evidence requirements, leaving only GPPS, where they are already likely to be favourably positioned.
10. Three Rules to Follow
These protect your practice.
- 1Never offer patients anything in exchange for a review. No prize draws, no discounts, no gifts. Incentivising reviews breaches Google's terms and UK consumer protection law, and can get your reviews removed and your listing penalised.
- 2Display QR codes openly to everyone. Do not hand the code only to patients you expect to be positive. Open display in patient-visible areas means everyone sees it, which is exactly right.
- 3Never ask a patient to change or remove a review. If you receive an unfair review, respond publicly, politely, and briefly through your Google Business Profile. Never contact the patient privately about it, and never discuss clinical detail in a public reply.
11. A Note on Negative Reviews
Unhappy patients leave reviews without any prompting, and always will. Feedbacker gives your satisfied patients an equally frictionless route to have their voice heard, correcting the natural imbalance where only the loudest minority are amplified online.
Research consistently shows patients are most likely to leave a review when asked immediately after a consultation, whilst still on the premises, rather than when sent a link hours later at home. Feedbacker is designed around exactly this moment.
Good luck.