What is the Advice and support service?

We give housing-related support to people living in Newcastle. By giving support, we aim to help you:

• set up and run a new home;
• maintain your home; and
• continue to live independently.

We aim to help prevent people in Newcastle becoming homeless.

Protecting vulnerable adults

We contribute to Newcastle Safeguarding Adults Policy. This policy has been developed by a number of agencies and it explains how these agencies will work together to achieve more commitment to protecting adults. The policy aims to make sure that:

• people using our services are safe;
• we give help, if it is needed, to support people who are being abused or neglected in their own homes; and
• communities can be safer.

Will it cost me anything to use the Advice and support service?

No. This service is completely free. It costs us money to run this service and we meet this cost through funding from Supporting People.

What services do we offer?

The Advice and support service is arranged into three teams offering a range of different services. The three teams are:

• the Outreach Team;
• the Refugee Move On Team; and
• the Pathways Team.

Visit the Advice and Support Service pages to find out more.

What can I expect from the service?

• We will make a support plan with you, and review this with you at least once every three months.
• If it is necessary, we can work with other agencies to help meet your needs.
• When you don’t need our support any more, we will close your file and write to you to tell you why. We will also ask you to fill in a questionnaire, which will help us continue to improve our service.
• We will offer to help you get benefits and other services.

Our service standards

• After you are referred to us, we will always arrange to interview you. Our target is to see at least 92% of new customers within 10 working days of you being referred to us.
• We will always create a support plan for you. Our target is to do this during the first interview for at least 90% of our customers.
• We aim for at least 90% of our customers to be satisfied with staff from the Advice and support service.

Sharing information with other agencies

We respect your right to privacy. However, there may be times where we have to reveal your information to other agencies. This may be when we are concerned about the welfare of a child or if we think a vulnerable adult may be abused. If we have to share information with other agencies, we will do our best to let you know we are going to do this.

Click here to download a full copy of the Advice and Support Service Service Standards leaflet