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January 2004Client User Group Jon Duckworth Client Liaison Officer I have recently taken over as Client Liaison Officer for the Funds. The job involves looking after our consultation group who meet regularly at our office to discuss issues relating to the ILF – in particular, the way we provide our service and the way we communicate with our clients. My aims are to extend our consultation to include customers from other parts of the country, and to find out more about the experiences of disabled people from ethnic communities in relation to the ILF. I am currently networking to build relationships with community and disability groups that will help us conduct our research. This is a big job and any advice or help Local Authorities can offer would be much appreciated. If you would like to know more about our consultation group or feel you could be of assistance in any way, please contact me at the office by letter or phone on 0115 9450773, or by email jon.duckworth@ilf.org.uk Policy Updates Robyn Lewis Customer Services Officer The following policies have all been updated since October 2003, if you would like to see a full list of policy documents, or wish to see an individual policy please do not hesitate to contact - Robyn Lewis on robyn.lewis@ilf.org.uk or 0115 9450842 or Matthew Harrison on 0115 9450754. Parenting The Funds cannot make payments to assist a Fund user to be a parent. The Funds’ payments must be for personal or domestic care for the Fund user, and cannot extend to family members; therefore, tasks that are only undertaken because the Fund user is a parent cannot be funded. LA Provision Versus Cost The Funds will normally expect the Local Authority (LA) to maintain their level of provision even when services change, and possibly costs. Unless there are exceptional circumstances, provision should be the priority over cost. Regardless of whether the overall cost changes, the actual level of care should remain the same, unless the LA cost decreases to below their minimum £200 per week (pw) input. In cases where the LA cost has reduced, but they have maintained the provision, so long as the £200pw limit is still met, the Funds can allow this change. Where previously on an agreed care plan the LA had made a specific cash provision towards the total cost of a package the Funds should expect that they continue to meet the same percentage as previously, this should be amended where there is a decrease and to maintain the same percentage would take the LA below £200pw. The Funds should continue to maintain its agreed percentage as well. Carers’ Legislation As with supporting people monies services provided under Carers’ Legislation cannot be included in the LA’s minimum £200pw. If this provision had been agreed before 1/1/04, the Funds will accept it as an ongoing part of the package. Transition From Children’s To Adults’ Services Where a new applicant or Fund user moves from children’s services to adult services and the package changes and/or is re-evaluated, the Funds will not expect the LA to maintain its previous input from the children’s budget, irrespective of how long the LA children’s budget had contributed, (unless the new LA contribution would go below the LA minimum £200pw). However, the Funds will only allow this where the LA has contacted the Funds within three months of the change from children’s to adult’s services taking place, and will not consider any retrospective requests. If the change took place outside this three-month period, the LA will be expected to maintain the new input. Local Education Authority Robyn Lewis Customer Services Officer The term LA in literature from the Funds means LA Social Services only. There appears to be some confusion about what the Funds’ consider as the LA social services contribution. The Funds disregard any financial assistance from a Local Education Authority with relation to the LA input for both the £200pw minimum input for 93 Fund users, or the total gross package cost in regard to the maximum sums. The Education Authority can provide assistance towards the educational requirements of a Fund user including tuition costs, equipment, and PAs to assist with educational tasks e.g. note taking, report writing etc. However, assistance with personal care tasks would usually fall within the remit of the Local Authority Social Services, which the Funds can have regard to in its minimum and maximum amounts. Change of Title for VSWs Trevor Chapman Information and Services Director You will all be familiar with our Visiting Social Workers (VSWs) who carry out visits to clients and report to our administrative staff in Nottingham. Certain provisions in the Care Standards Act mean that we will no longer be able to use the term Social Worker. As a result, we will be calling them ILF Assessors (ILFAs for short). We have started to introduce this new terminology in our letters and publications. For a little while, as we use up current stocks, we will continue to use forms and leaflets that use the term VSW. New prints will use the term ILFA. Our letters may continue for a time to use the old term but will be changing in coming months. We hope that the change will not prove too confusing and apologise for any confusion as both terms may be in use at the same time during the transition. SSD 1000 – A Reminder Paula Curtis Review Support Team Please be aware that when LA Social Workers are asked to attend a revisit of an ILF client, it is extremely important that the SSD1000 is fully completed. At present, we are finding that the majority of SSD1000s do not include the start date for each provision that the LA funds. It is essential that we have the start dates as we are often involved in £ for £ negotiations with the LA and need a clear representation of any increases that may have occurred since the Fund’s last assessment. May I take this opportunity to thank you in advance for your assistance. Visit Review Programme – an update Suzanne Holt Section Manager The first round of our visit review programme is now nearing its completion, with hopefully all outstanding visits to be finalised by the end of February 2004. The second phase of the programme commenced on 5 January 2004. Christmas and the New Year have had a slight impact on the clearance times for both the Extension and 1993 Funds. Clearance times on both Funds are steadily improving and we are optimistic that we will achieve our March 2004 targets. The review teams will also be aiming to clear all outstanding 2003 visits within the first quarter of this year. As at December 2003, the 1993 Fund average clearance rate of cases within 20 weeks has improved to 70.45% from 44.2% in December 2002. The clearance rate for the Extension Fund has also improved to 82.5% from that of 81.5%. Revisits selected in the second phase should be processed quicker than that in the first. This is because a lot of groundwork has already been done, and our computer database now holds much more up-to-date information which will assist in the actual issuing of the revisits. The updating of the Fund’s computer system giving all staff access to e-mail will go some way to making the requesting and receiving of information more efficient. Advance Forecasting Clarification for Contact Officers, further to our letter sent to all Contact Officers in August 2003 and the July 2003 Newsletter. These lists are intended to assist both you and the Funds to deal with a revisit as quickly and smoothly as possible. By giving you notice (2 months) you will be able to ensure that, whoever is needed in your Department to provide current information about your LA provision, and/or attend the visit with our own ILF Assessor, is available when the time comes. Unfortunately, we are unable to give you specific dates of future revisits to our users when sending out these lists for 1993 Fund users. Copyright Trevor Chapman Information and Services Director All ILF written material is subject to our copyright unless otherwise indicated. However, unless expressly indicated on the material to the contrary, it may be reproduced free of charge in any format or medium, as long as it is reproduced accurately and not used in a misleading manner. Where any copyright items are being re-published or copied to others, you must identify the source of the material and acknowledge the copyright status. Permission to reproduce material does not extend to any material that is the copyright of third parties. You must obtain authorisation to reproduce such material directly from the copyright holders concerned. If you are unsure whether you can reproduce any material provided by the ILF please contact Simon French, Information Manager, at the ILF on (0115) 945 0775 or simon.french@ilf.org.uk. In order to keep our costs down we do encourage local authorities to photocopy our forms and leaflets if we are unable to supply sufficient quantities. You do not need to seek our permission to do this but please make sure that you have the latest version of our publications or forms. The logo is also considered to be subject to copyright. It has come to our attention that some organisations have been reproducing this logo on publications of their own. Please do not do so without first obtaining the ILF’s permission. While we do not wish to hinder any initiative that encourages the correct and widespread use of the Funds we are concerned that some material published by other organisations may appear to be ILF material. We will be happy to discuss ways that such material can best indicate the partnership between our organisations. Please contact Simon French if you wish to discuss use of our logo. Professional Users Guide (PUG) Jeff Macbeth Customer Services Manager In the last newsletter we mentioned that the PUG was currently being put together, and I am pleased to say that this document has now been completed. We are now in the process of publication, and hope to make this available to all Contact Officers in a number of different formats (this is a large and extensive document, to replace the old Local Authority Guidance Notes) soon. We will be in touch with you about this in the near future. Freedom Of Information Act Simon French Information Manager From March 2004, the Funds will have a Publication Scheme available on our website or on request. The Publication Scheme explains what kind of information is held by the Funds, and how this is made publicly available. If you require any further information regarding this scheme, please contact Simon French, Information Manager, at the ILF on (0115) 945 0775 or simon.french@ilf.org.uk. CONTACT THE FUNDS ILF telephone number: 0845 601 8815 Tell the operator your client's name and whether they are an Extension Fund or 1993 Fund user. If you do not know this, give them your reference number (the 4 - 5 digit number that appears on letters from the Funds). You will be put through to the person who deals with their case, or, if they are not available, one of their colleagues. To write to the ILF: Independent Living Funds PO Box 7525 Nottingham NG2 4ZT Email: To email the Funds about your case send it to client.service@ilf.org.uk The email will be directed to the caseworker. If you have a general enquiry, or an application form request, please send this to funds@ilf.org.uk Fax: 1993 Fund: 0115 945 0945 Extension Fund: 0115 945 0946 Website: www.ilf.org.uk Textphone: 0845 601 8816 If you would like to tell us what you think of this newsletter, or what you would like to see in future newsletters, or would like to comment on the service you receive from the Funds, you can write to Robyn Lewis at the address above or email to robyn.lewis@ilf.org.uk |
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