Tracy Hubball – Social Team Manager

Providing advice and information. Closely linked to the Community Offer, covering the local communities in 6 areas of the borough. Organisations working within these areas providing services of support and advice and information. Assist refer to Community Offer groups. (although local people can refer themselves to groups supporting the community offer).

There is no change with the administration of the Blue Badge scheme.

The options on the telephone keypad when calling remains the same.

The key change is that ASSIST have relocated to the Independent Living Centre and is co-located with the independent living team so they work closely with equipment/adaptations and reablement colleagues.

Other staff have also been relocated so less staff have made the move to the Independent Living Centre. Social Workers are now based in community locations across the borough.

The ASSIST hours of operation have changed to 0900 – 17.30 Monday to Thursday and 0900 to 1700 on Fridays. These changes follow analysis of the call volumes. Outside of these hours the emergency duty service is available to cover emergencies and to pass any routine calls back to ASSIST when they reopen. There has been no feedback about the change in the hours which reflects the low call volumes received previously.

Response to questions:

Answering phones – ASSIST aims to answer all calls within 30 seconds, 80% of calls are answered within that window. It does often depend on the time of day. The longest wait time is less than 4 minutes.

One member stated she had been a mystery shopper, The service used to be horrific but now when calling you are told how many calls in front of you, it’s a lot better.

Assessments – ASSIST carry out assessments for new customers. They listen to the customer’s views rather than it being a yes/no questionnaire as before. We allow you to tell your story. You will be reassessed if you are already in receipt of services or your circumstances have changed

Regards help for carers, ASSIST will continue with assessments for carers, however is also able to give advice and support with applications for the Local Welfare Provision scheme for resettlement packages, people in crisis (what were ‘crisis loans’).

What services do the out of hours duty team provide? The out of hour’s team will respond to calls when ASSIST are closed. The emergency team includes social workers and are able to support crisis situations although they are not medically trained. They will, if necessary, carry out visits during the night and will alert emergency services if required. The team is co-located with the emergency alarms team.

The number to call ASSIST is 0845352 2266.

There are further improvements planned for the future which could include a better contact number (i.e. making sure local call rates only apply).

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