Access to Work (AtW)
Access to Work offers practical advice and help in a flexible way so that it can be tailored to suit your needs and help you make the most of your opportunities in work by helping you to tackle some of the practical obstacles you may meet.
Access to Work can also help if you need help at job interviews, for example a communicator or interpreter. It applies to any paid job, part-time or full-time, permanent or temporary. If your disability or health condition affects the kind of work you do, ask about Access at JobCentre Plus, which is a business within the Department for Work and Pensions. In April 2002, this replaced the Employment Service, which ran Jobcentres, and those parts of the Benefits Agency, which provided services to people of working age through social security offices. Not all areas have Jobcentre Plus offices. You can get details from their website here. In the meantime, some Jobcentres and social security offices provide this service.
Access to Work can assist in a number of ways. It can help pay for a communicator if you are deaf or have a hearing impairment and need a communicator with you at an interview; or a reader at work, if you are blind or have a visual impairment. It can provide special equipment (or alteration to existing equipment) to suit your particular work needs because of your disability. It can provide alterations to premises or your working environment if you need it. It also covers the provision of a support worker, if you need practical help.
If you are unemployed with a job to go to, have just taken up a job or are in or starting self-employment, Access to Work will meet up to 100% of the approved costs of help. If you have already been in your job for six weeks or more, Access to Work will meet up to 80% of the approved costs of help after the first £300. If total approved costs are more than £10,000 over three years, Access to Work will pay up to 100% of the approved costs between £10,000 and the actual costs. If you are in self-employment, Access to Work will meet up to 100% of the approved costs of help no matter how long you have been self-employed. If you need help with Travel to Work or Communicator Support at interview, Access to Work will meet all of the approved costs whether you are unemployed or already in a job. Help will be approved for as long as you need it up to a maximum of three years. After that, it will consider renewing help under the rules of the programme in operation at that time.
Your JobCentre Plus office, or the Access to Work Adviser (AtW), who is usually based at the local Jobcentre Plus office, will be able to give you details of how to apply for Access to Work in your area and put you in touch with an AtW who will explain how it works. Talk to your AtW before a job interview about the ways Access to Work can be used to suit your circumstances. The rules may change at any time, and the AtW will ensure you have all the up-to-date information. At a job interview, it is worth pointing out to your interviewer the range of help that is available through Access to Work. You could suggest that the employer contacts your AtW Advisor to find out more.
Once your Access to Work help is in place, your AtW Adviser will keep in touch with you and your employer to make sure everything is going smoothly. When you make an application for support under Access to Work it is hoped that you will be completely satisfied with the advice and service provided. But, if something goes wrong or you are not satisfied with the outcome, they will look into it and get back to you within ten working days. Just ask your Access to Work Business Centre Manager about these review arrangements. Usually, the information needed for Access to Work will be obtained by talking to you and your employer by telephone. However, sometimes a visit to you at work may be made to ensure that your need are fully understood, though this will be explained to you beforehand. Your AtW Adviser can also advise on how best to find the most suitable jobs or training, how the Job Introduction Scheme works, which offers a chance to try out a job for an introductory period and also, Work Preparation, including job trials with an employer, training to update and gain new skills, and work opportunities in WORKSTEP. Knowing about Access to Work could make the difference between a job opportunity and a missed opportunity.
Specific examples of help at work for us are the funding of a Speech to Text operator to provide live transcriptions of meetings and similar important occasions when your hearing might put you at a disadvantage. Another is the provision of adapted telephones or MiniComs.