Benefits Form Filling Adviser

Our volunteer Benefits Advisers aid clients with disabilities throughout Norwich whilst providing a fantastic support to the work of our organisation. The help our volunteers offer comes via assisting clients in completing benefit claim forms, currently with a strong focus on PIP.

This is a great opportunity for you to learn all about benefits available to disabled people, from finding out about conditions of entitlement to learning how to make the best case for a client. Whether you already have some knowledge and you want to make use of this to help others, or if you have no experience and are keen to learn employable skills, this role could provide you with an interesting and rewarding volunteering opportunity. 

The Benefits Adviser role will involve assisting our clients with the following:  

• Assisting them to make claims, including support with form filling 

• Offering information by Teams or in person (we can train you to use Teams if you are unfamiliar with the system)

• Signposting or referring clients on to other organisations where appropriate. 

• Keeping accurate and up to date case notes  

• Ongoing learning to ensure knowledge is kept up to date and accurate 

Full training is available to provide you with the skills and knowledge required to carry out this. 

Volunteering Arrangements 

This role can be carried out on site, at one of our Norwich premises, we will supply you with an Equal Lives laptop and you will have your own Equal Lives email address as well as an ID lanyard. 

All volunteers are required to undertake our core training programme. This covers basic safeguarding and other key features, such as data protection.  

 All volunteers are required to be able to visit our Norwich based offices to perform the necessary DBS and data protection checks.

New volunteers will have an opportunity to ‘shadow’ experienced volunteers and members of staff before flying solo. 

 Dependent on the candidate, there may be additional opportunities to participate in a variety of accredited training courses. Please ask a manager for further details. 

 Volunteers are required to adhere to the organisation’s policies and practice guidelines. 

 Reasonable expenses, including travel whilst undertaking this role will be reimbursed. This includes mileage and parking costs. 

 Applications must include 2 satisfactory references from individuals who have known you in a professional or educational capacity for at least 12 months. Applicants must complete a Disclosure and Barring Service check before any volunteering can commence. 

 Although you are required to do your training during office hours of 8:30am to 4:30pm Monday to Friday, we are flexible to how many hours you wish to volunteer for and how long, in terms of months, you want to volunteer with us for, so long as it is above 6 months.