An exciting opportunity to join the Rough Sleeper Outreach team within housing needs as a Housing, Health and Welfare Officer.
To provide a holistic service to rough sleepers and those who have previously slept rough through assessment, referral, and support to access appropriate services.
1. To provide Housing & Homelessness advice to rough sleepers in an outreach setting, ensuring clients benefit from the same access to services as those accessing through traditional routes.
2. To drive the council’s reduction of temporary accommodation expenditure by ensuring that all other avenues are explored, and customers are diverted away from its use.
3. To support the collation of data and information for the Department for Housing, Communities and Local Government thereby assisting the government in its work to capture the true picture of homelessness and its impact on society.
4. To work alongside the Rough Sleeper Outreach team in ensuring all rough sleepers have an offer to leave the streets and that this offer remains relevant.
Main Duties and Responsibilities:
1. To provide an effective, customer-friendly and efficient service to clients presenting with housing problems; to support them in keeping their current home or in accessing a new home in the public or private housing sector.
2. To advise clients on a full range of options to solve their housing problem, including intervention if threatened with homelessness, registering on the council housing list, initiatives for social housing tenants, private renting, mortgage advice, moving out of area, shared housing, and reconnection.
3. To provide an effective homeless prevention service for single applicants and where appropriate to those whom the council may not have a statutory duty by providing advice and/or assistance with private rented sector accommodation, hostels, refuge or other means which may help them prevent or relieve their homelessness either in the short or long term.
4. Assess holistically the needs of Rough Sleepers, considering their housing, health, and welfare. Ensure appropriate referrals to agencies to support the rough sleeper.
5. Encourage the rough sleeper to access the support that is available.
6. Engage and feed into discussions on the best way to support the client taking into account their needs and wishes.
7. Assist clients where required in readiness for temporary or permanent re-housing, e.g., support services, furniture, financial/benefits advice.
8. Provide advice and assistance in the completion of housing application documents and any other documents where to do so will assist clients with their housing issues.
9. To comply with all relevant statutory requirements, Government Guidance, Codes of conduct, and Peterborough City Council policies and procedures.
10. To ensure full and accurate records of all clients, all advice and support provided.
11. To maintain accurate written and computer records, reports, & other monitoring information as required in connection with the various duties undertaken, and keep other records necessary to provide an adequate management information database.
12. To develop effective working relationships with colleagues within other council and statutory services, external bodies, service users, landlords as well as voluntary and other housing organisations and ensure effective communication and referrals throughout.
13. To advise clients of available tenancy support services including income maximisation, Discretionary Housing Payments, Rent Deposit schemes, mutual exchange, debt and rent arrears advice, and Benefits support.
14. To assist in developing a full range of information and publicity for all clients as well as internal procedures.
15. To understand the value of information to the council and to contribute to good information governance by keeping information safe, accurate, up to date and available to those who need it.
16. To provide advice services to clients through personal or telephone interviews, correspondence, advocacy, reception, home visiting, and outreach work where required.
This position is complex with the postholder being required to liaise with customers, statutory organisations, advocates, and third sector providers to support the client with finding a sustainable housing solution where they may have complex and multiple needs for example mental health combined with drug and/or alcohol addiction. The post holder will be required to be innovative, dynamic, and solutions-focused to either prevent or relieve homelessness. In addition to this, the post holder will be required to develop, design, and implement new operating environments to develop the wider Housing Needs service. Any other duties appropriate to the post and grade.
Our Employee Benefits
We value our colleagues and have developed a number of benefits in addition to our generous annual leave starting at 25 days + bank holidays, sick pay, and local government pension scheme:
1. Access to a range of benefits via Vivup, including in-store and online discounts as well as our Cycle to Work and Home & Electronics schemes.
2. Buy up to 10 days additional annual leave (pro-rata).
3. Access to car lease scheme.
4. Take your bank holidays flexibly to better suit your personal circumstances.
5. Make Additional Voluntary Contributions (Shared Cost AVCs) to your pension with tax and National Insurance savings.
6. Access to development opportunities including apprenticeships to support your personal and professional growth.
7. Paid volunteering hours each year so you can make a positive impact on our community during your normal working day.
8. Access to our equality, diversity, and inclusion network.
9. Opportunities to receive Employee Recognition Awards.
We are proud to be an equal opportunities employer, dedicated to fostering diversity, advancing equity, and building an inclusive workplace for everyone. We welcome applications from individuals of all backgrounds and particularly encourage those from underrepresented groups, including disabled people, care leavers, and individuals from minority ethnic communities. Your unique perspectives and experiences are encouraged and valued and will play a vital role in our success.
We are committed to making our recruitment process as accessible as possible. If you are disabled and require any reasonable adjustments during the application or interview process, please contact pccrecruitment@peterborough.gov.uk, and we will work with you to meet your needs.
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