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Appraisal Leads and Responsible Officers

Appraisal Leads and Responsible Officers


Specific SOAR user guidance for Appraisal Leads and Responsible Officers are in development, and will be published ASAP.

Please note however, most of the information and access Appraisal Leads and ROs will have are be similar to that of the Admin Teams.

Please also review guidance for Appraisers and Appraisees if you are unfamiliar with SOAR (items listed in sub menu on side); or review the overview video guidance.

Key SOAR functions for Appraisal Leads include:

  • Review Appraisal Form 4s
  • Approve Forms 5A/B (non participation of appraisal)
  • Make suggested outcomes (ready/not ready) in support of a doctor's revalidation
  • Access to appraisers' feedback reports

Key SOAR functions for ROs includes:

  • Review Form 4s of all doctors in employing health board
  • Make revalidation recommendations (which is sent to GMC Connect for processing)

1. What reporting functions are available on SOAR?

There are two reporting types on SOAR:

  1. Exported results from Search pages
  2. Specific reports

Guidance below describes how both functions work.

If there is any particular report you are looking for that's not currently available, please liaise with the team and we will take things forward from there.

1a. Exported results from Search pages

There are various search functions on SOAR, such as list of Appraisees, Appraisers, Appraisal Meetings etc.  Within each search function, where applicable there will be an "Export" button that allows you to export the search results into a spreadsheet for further analysis as needed.

Important thing to remember is hit the search button first to action the search, and then you can export the results from there.

1b. Specific reports on SOAR

There are a number of reports available on SOAR, the below table highlights what's available and who has access.  To access the reports:

  • login to SOAR
  • click on "Reports" from the menu
  • click on the name of the report you require
  • set the search parameters (e.g. health board, date from and to etc) and click the View/Search button
  • the results will be shown with an option to download/export the results to a different format as needed
Title Description PC Appraisal Lead SC Appraisal Lead Responsible Officer
002 - Appraisees Due for Revalidation Searches for those who are due their revalidation (set to next 3 months by default). Please be advised that the "Last Revalidated Date" field is calculated by taking the next "Revalidation Due Date" and minus 5 years from it as we are unable to retrieve this data from GMC Connect. Yes Yes Yes
003 - PC Appraisees due MSF and PSQ List of Primary Care Appraisees due MSF and PSQ before Revalidation (consider downloading report into Excel for better ease of use) Yes    
003 - SC Appraisees due MSF and PSQ List of Secondary Care Appraisees due MSF and PSQ before Revalidation (consider downloading report into Excel for better ease of use)   Yes  
004 - PC Historic Appraiser Details Tracks historic Appraisers in a health board, and how many appraisals they have scheduled and completed, along with their contact details. Yes    
004 - SC Historic Appraiser Details Tracks historic Appraisers in a health board, and how many appraisals they have scheduled and completed, along with their contact details.   Yes  
005-GN_AppraiseeCountByBoard A count of Appraisees assigned to Appraisers, unassigned Appraises and the total number of appraisees per healthboard Yes Yes Yes
008 - PC Appraisees Never Been Appraised List of Primary Care Appraisees who have NEVER been appraised. Yes   Yes
008 - SC Appraisees Never Been Appraised List of Secondary Care Appraisees who have NEVER been appraised.   Yes Yes
009 - PC Appraisees NOT Appraised in Specified Period List of Primary Care Appraisees that have not been appraised in a specified period (defaulted to search for past 12 months). Yes    
009 - SC Appraisees NOT Appraised in Specified Period List of Secondary Care Appraisees that have not been appraised in a specified period (defaulted to search for past 12 months).   Yes  
011 - Feedback By Appraiser (PC) Primary Care Appraiser Feedback (Form 6) report Yes    
011 - Feedback by Appraiser (SC) Secondary Care Appraiser Feedback (Form 6) report   Yes  
013 - PC Form 4 Completion Analysis Examines the appraisals that took place in a specified period, and how long each took for completion (default date range is past 12 months). Yes    
013 - SC Form 4 Completion Analysis Examines the appraisals that took place in a specified period, and how long each took for completion (default date range is past 12 months).   Yes  
014 - Appraisees Appraisal and Revalidation Details Displays Appraisees' details, including scheduled appraisals for last 6 appraisal periods. Please be advised that the "Last Revalidated Date" field is calculated by taking the next "Revalidation Due Date" and minus 5 years from it as we are unable to retrieve this data from GMC Connect. Yes Yes Yes

1c. How to access Form 6 reports

Feedback Form 6 is completed by appraisees (Form 6A) and appraisers (Form 6B) at the conclusion of the appraisal.

Anonymised reports are available on SOAR via the "Reports" page (Report 11) from the menu on the left.

You will be prompted to enter From/To dates (appraisal meeting) in the search criteria; and a report is only generated IF the search result has a minimum of 3 appraisals (to help ensure the process stays anonymised).

2. How do ROs revalidate on SOAR?

ROs have the function to make revalidation recommendations directly on SOAR (saves from having to login to GMC Connect separately).

This can be done individually or in batches, and we have also built in an extra step for Appraisal Leads to review prior to ROs' actioning (which can be bypassed as needed).

The process is that Appraisal Leads would review the list of people who require revalidation first and make a suggestion, based on information available on SOAR, whether the appraisee is ready or not for revalidation.  The idea is that those marked as "ready" would appear on the ROs' list with confidence that they have been reviewed already.

The function/authority to make the revalidation recommendations lie solely with the RO (not Appraisal Leads).

When someone is within 3 months of their revalidation due date, they are labelled as "under notice" on GMC Connect.  These doctors are listed on SOAR for the Appraisal Leads/ROs to review and action as appropriate.

To review the list of people due for revalidation, click on "Revalidation Recommendation" from the menu.  By default it will list those deemed as "Ready" by the system for review and actioning.  Either select all on the list and batch "revalidate" everyone as a single action, or review each one individually and action from there.

You can only batch action positive recommendations.  Those needing deferrals or not recommend will require actioning individually.

3. How do Appraisal Leads sign off Form 5?

There are two types of Form 5:

  • Form 5A:  Exemption from appraisal
  • Form 5B:  Notification of non-engagement

When a Form 5A or 5B has been submitted by the appraiser (or local admin), the Appraisal Lead has to countersign to approve the submission and they will receive a system notification on this.  To review and sign off the Form 5:

  1. Login to SOAR and switch into the Appraisal Lead role
  2. Either click on the link from the email which will take you straight to the Form 5, or use the available search functions to locate the appraisee/appraisal in question
  3. When in the Form 5, review the content submitted by the appraiser
  4. The "Approve" button is at the bottom of the page if you are happy to sign off the Form 5; else you can reject the Form 5 (you will be prompted for comments)

4. How to search for outstanding appraisals to chase up?

To check on whose appraisals still to be signed off, you can search the appraisal using both the interview and the form statuses:

Interview search filters

  1. Click on "Interviews" from the menu
  2. in the "Interview status" dropdown select "To be submitted and in progress"
  3. in the "Form status" dropdown select "Form 4 forwarded"
  4. Click "Search"

This will bring up a list of appraisees whose Form 4 still awaits their review and sign off.

You can change the filter for Form status to "Form 4 draft" and this will list the appraisals where it still awaits the appraiser to forward the form.

If you change the Form status filter to "Form 5A forwarded", this brings up a list of appraisals where the Form 5A has been forwarded by the appraiser, but is waiting for the Appraisal Lead to sign off.

Related Documents

SOAR Guidance for ROs

Guidance on how to use SOAR's Revalidation Dashboard to make recommendations to the GMC

Date updated: 21/03/2022

Size: 1388032 - KB

Type: pps

(98) Using News Alert Function

Guidance for Appraisers, Admin teams and Appraisal Advisers

Date updated: 21/03/2022

Size: 1223680 - KB

Type: pps

(99) How to Contact the SOAR Helpdesk

For all SOAR Users

Date updated: 21/03/2022

Size: 807424 - KB

Type: pps



This page was last updated on: 05/08/2025