1. Start with licensing identity
For Illinois, HomeBase starts with public licensing information and stable agency identity fields such as legal or DBA name, license number, office address, city, ZIP code and telephone when available.
TRANSPARENT BY DESIGN
How HomeBase researches home-care agencies.
HomeBase compares licensed home-care agencies using structured public information. The goal is not to make every agency look complete. The goal is to preserve what the evidence supports, distinguish what it does not support, and make that difference visible.
2. Verify the official website
Website candidates are matched conservatively against agency identity evidence. A questionable domain is not treated as official merely because the company name appears on the page.
3. Research structured care facts
Once an official website is verified, HomeBase reviews it for documented care capabilities, service areas, public business contact information and selected published policies that are useful for matching.
4. Unknown stays Unknown
Missing information is not treated as a negative answer. A capability is recorded as Yes only when supported, No only when the source explicitly supports a negative conclusion, and otherwise Unknown.
SERVICE-AREA EVIDENCE
Office location is not service-area proof.
An agency can have an office in one community and serve a much larger or different area. HomeBase therefore keeps office location separate from service-area evidence.
Explicit city coverage
The agency's researched source directly documents that specific city.
County-derived coverage
The agency documents service for the county containing the city. HomeBase may use that evidence for matching while still labeling it as county-derived rather than pretending the city was explicitly named.
WHAT A MATCH MEANS
Documented capability is not current caregiver availability.
A HomeBase match means the stored evidence supports the agency's service area and one or more relevant care capabilities. It does not mean a particular caregiver is currently available, that a schedule can be accepted today, or that a quoted price is guaranteed. Families should confirm current availability, scheduling and pricing directly with the agency.
QUALITY AND UPDATES
Evidence can improve without rewriting the rules.
HomeBase stores capabilities and care requirements in a structured taxonomy rather than hard-coding one database column for every service. New research can therefore add stronger evidence, new service areas or new care concepts while preserving the provenance of the facts already collected.
Public websites change, agencies close or move, and some agencies publish far more detail than others. HomeBase's research reflects the public evidence available when it was checked; an Unknown result is intentionally preserved when the available official source does not establish a fact either way.
USE THE EVIDENCE
Compare agencies against the care situation.
No name, phone number, email address or account is required to begin comparing.