Guidance

Chapter 6: Working with Participants with complex needs and /or additional support requirements

Updated 27 November 2024

Please note: Please follow the processes outlined for both WHP Core and WHP Pioneer. Elements that are exempt from this can be found in Chapter 2b WHP Pioneer eligibility and entry points

ESF Requirement Changes

1. When referring to ESF Requirements within this chapter please note the following changes to ESF Requirements effective from 24 July 2023 (England).

• providers no longer need to submit or process ESF 14-20 Initial or ESF 14-20 End forms for Participants
• products can be updated to remove ESF logos. Changes to existing products and any new marketing and publicity materials should be sent to WHP.ENQUIRIES@DWP.GOV.UK for approval.
• providers should continue to use the current template for Good News Stories, until notified of amendment.
• participants you have already submitted ESF 14-20 Initial and ESF 14-20 End forms for over the lifetime of your WHP contract continue to be subject to ESF obligations. This includes Audit requirements and the ESF Document Retention Policy which at present is expected to be 2034.

In addition to the above, ESF requirements do not apply to participants started on or after 1 November 2022’

Please note: You are expected to continue to complete and to share Good News Stories with your Performance Manager as part of your contract with DWP.

Introduction Work and Health Programme

2. The purpose of this chapter is to provide a single dedicated source of information related to working with all Participants who have complex needs and/or additional support requirements.

3. Complex needs may be defined as difficult personal circumstances and/or life events. They may be permanent or temporary in nature and the degree to which they affect a Participant will vary from one person to another.

4. The chapter explains the procedures you must follow to enable a Participant with complex needs and/or additional support requirements to access and use WHP provision in a comparable way to other participants.

5. The chapter also provides guidance on taking action, when appropriate, to ensure the safety and well-being of Participants with complex needs and/or additional support requirements.

Disabled Participants

6. For disabled Participants, you are legally required under the Equality Act 2010 to provide reasonable adjustments. Interaction with the Participant must determine what tailored support or reasonable adjustments they require to have equal access to products and services.

DWP notifies you that a Participant has complex needs and/or additional support requirements

7. DWP may notify you that a Participant has complex needs and/or additional support requirements at different points of the Participant’s time on provision. These include;

• when referring the Participant to provision
• when notifying you of a change in a Participant’s circumstances
• via a notification from a decision maker following a sanction referral.

8. Please see Detailed background and further information for the DWP approach to identifying and supporting these Participants.

Notification on referral from DWP

9. When DWP has identified that a Participant has complex needs/additional support requirements, they will notify you of this as part of the information they send to you to support the referral. You will be notified of this by the inclusion of the wording “May require reasonable adjustment or additional support” in a free text box on the Participant referral.

10. You will need to carry out a number of actions to ensure that you are fully informed as to the Participant’s complex needs and put in place any reasonable adjustments to enable them to be able to attend and take part in the initial meeting. This could include interacting with the Participant in order to determine what tailored support and reasonable adjustments they will require to have equal access to products and services.

Notification following a change in a Participant’s circumstances

11. If Jobcentre Plus becomes aware that a Participant has developed complex needs and/or additional support requirements as a result of a change in their circumstances whilst they are on provision with you, they will notify you via a change of circumstances notification form CEPD1 or UC78e by adding the words ‘May require reasonable adjustment or additional support’.

12. Please refer to Work and Health Programme Provider Guidance Chapter 10 Change of Circumstances and Notifications for details of the change of circumstances notification process.

Notification of changes throughout participation on Programme

13. At any point during a Participant’s time with you on provision, Jobcentre Plus may notify you that a Participant may require specialist help and/or additional support to:

• access and use your services for example: using on-line services and/or understanding letters and forms
• maintain conditionality, for example a Participant may have difficulty understanding a requirement to attend an appointment, undertake an activity or remember what evidence they need to provide
• maintain their finances
• understand information
• interpret situations
• make decisions
• give consent
• communicate information or their views.

This list is not exhaustive.

14. The notification from DWP may detail the Participant’s specific needs or requirements. It may also simply inform you that a Participant has been identified as having complex needs and/or require additional support without providing any further details of the Participant’s specific needs or requirements. In either circumstance, you must ensure that you identify and address the Participant’s specific individual needs and support requirements to enable them to participate fully in your provision.

15. This may include:

• discussing with the Participant (or if appropriate their representative or appointee) any support/reasonable adjustment the Participant requires.
• encouraging the Participant to share with you the information and activities agreed as part of their Claimant Commitment or claimant Action Plan along with any information they have from the results of their Work Capability Assessment (WCA).

16. This should provide you with:

• an understanding of the level and type of activities a Participant has previously committed to undertake
• information you may use for comparison purposes following your own assessment of the Participants capability
• any adjustments that may have been made for the Participant which you should consider when agreeing activities and participation on the programme.

17. Where you are notified that a Participant has complex needs and/or additional support requirements, you should take special care to ensure that the Participant fully understands the benefit to themselves of sharing this information with you, and encourage them to do so.

18. In exceptional circumstances, where the Participant will not share, or does not understand the importance of sharing information regarding their complex needs and/or additional support requirements, you should contact the Jobcentre Plus Gatekeeper (or alternative locally agreed contact) for further information.

19. When the Jobcentre Plus Gatekeeper/local contact is not immediately available to answer your query, they will arrange a suitable alternative time to call you.

20. The discussion with the Jobcentre Plus Gatekeeper/ local contact will focus on factual information based on an individual’s limitations and the additional support they may require to:

• maintain conditionality (For example a Participant may have difficulty understanding a requirement to attend an appointment or undertake an activity or remember what evidence it is that they need to provide)
• maintain their finances
• understand information
• interpret situations
• make decisions
• give consent
• communicate information or their views
• require specialist help or support
• any reasonable adjustments that are required and have been made to access and use JCP services (for example, using on-line services or understanding letters and forms)
• activities agreed as part of their claimant commitment (providing you with an understanding of the level and type of activities a claimant has previously committed to undertake)
• details of the complex need/s and how that affects the claimant’s ability to use the services.

This list is not exhaustive.

21. You must ensure that your interaction with the Participant throughout their time on WHP is informed by their needs and requirements. You must ensure a clear support offer is in place enabling the Participant to access your provision and benefit from it in a comparable way to other Participants.

22. When you have identified that a Participant has complex needs/additional support requirements you may make arrangements to tailor the level of engagement if this is required. In this situation you must:

• agree a tailored plan of support/additional support as agreed with the Participant
• if engagement is modified you should agree a date to re-engage with the Participant to review the situation and this date should be recorded in the Participants records.
• update the Participants Action Plan.

23. Further information can be found in Work and Health Programme including WHP Pioneer Provider Guidance Chapter 10 Change of circumstances and notifications.

24. You must note on your systems the complex needs and/or additional support requirements that have been identified, and the support or reasonable adjustments that you have agreed with the Participant and put in place. This will form part of your evidence of two-way conversation and action planning. This evidence will be subject to validation and audit and must be retained in line with ESF document retention.

Provider identifies that a Participant has complex needs and/or additional support requirements

25. Throughout the duration of a Participant’s time on WHP, their circumstances may change.

26. The Participant is on the WHP for up to 456 calendar days with a possibility of it extending to a maximum of 639 calendar days where the Participant requires in work support. It is important that you continually monitor Participants to ascertain if there has been any change in their circumstances or condition that means they may now be considered to have complex needs or additional support requirements.

27. In your meetings and communications with the Participant you should be aware of any signs that may indicate the Participant may have complex needs/ additional support requirements that have not been previously notified to you.

28. A Participant may talk about a life event for example: bereavement or provide information in a conversation that suggests they may have complex personal circumstances. There may be a combination of factors which may indicate that a Participant may require additional support to fully participate in the Programme.

29. Individual circumstances that may suggest a Participant has complex needs or requirements for additional support include:

• mental health conditions
• memory loss caused by medication/illness
• learning difficulties
• reading and writing difficulties
• visual impairment
• drug or alcohol dependency
• domestic violence
• criminal convictions
• adverse impact during the Covid-19 period.

This list is not exhaustive.

30. There are indicators which may suggest that an individual requires additional support. The following lists at paragraph 31, paragraph 32 and paragraph 33 are not exhaustive.

31. When communicating with you, you may notice that the Participant is:

• in distress
• not understanding what is being said
• giving brief or one-word answers
• upset
• frustrated
• giving inappropriate responses which do not answer the question asked
• continuously avoiding eye contact
• having difficulty processing or remembering what is being said
• during telephone contact, holding a parallel conversation with someone else who may be their advocate or appointee, suggesting that alternative methods may be preferable.

Please note: You are required by your CSSs to contact the Participant every 10 working days as a minimum (unless the Participant prefers a different arrangement) to discuss the Participant’s wellbeing, action plans and job goals.

32. You may notice the following indicators which may suggest that a Participant may have reading and/or writing difficulties, or problems dealing with numbers and language, including:

• being reluctant to complete and read paperwork
• being unable to navigate telephony or online services
• English is not the Participants first language.

33. Certain life events may impact on an individual’s ability to fully access your support and use your services, including:

• adoption - children
• age - older person
• age - older person - financial abuse (pensions)
• age - young person - 16 and 17 year olds
• bereavement, Death - recently bereaved
• caring responsibilities
• children - child care
• children who leave care/over 18 care leavers
• crime – Victim of crime, including victims of modern slavery.
• cultural barriers, language barriers – English not their first language
• debt/indebted
• divorce/termination of Civil Partnerships
• domestic violence and abuse
• drug and alcohol dependency
• gender recognition/transgender
• homeless (person without accommodation, in temporary accommodation, frequent change of address)
• just left hospital
• leaving the Armed Forces, Ex-armed forces personnel and their spouses/partners
• lone Parent
• SCR (Special Customer Record) and MAPPA individuals (Multi Agency Public Protection Arrangements)
• offender/ex Offender/ Prisoners/Detainees
• race - Immigration status/refugee/people arriving from abroad
• redundancy
• retirement
• rural Isolation
• suicide and/or Self Harm Declaration.

34. In addition, you should assess information provided by Jobcentre Plus, including on-going Jobcentre Plus communications notifying you of a change in circumstance. You must ensure that your interaction with the Participant throughout their time on WHP is informed by their needs and requirements, and, that a clear support offer is in place to enable the Participant to access your provision and benefit from it in a comparable way to other Participants.

35. When you have identified that a Participant has complex needs/additional support requirements you may make arrangements to tailor the level of engagement. In this situation you must:

• agree a tailored plan of support/additional support as agreed with the Participant
• if engagement is modified you should agree a date to re-engage with the Participant to review the situation and this date should be recorded in the Participants records.
• update the Participant’s Action Plan.

36. Further information can be found in Work and Health Programme including WHP Pioneer Provider Guidance Chapter 10 Change of circumstances and notifications.

37. You must note on your systems the complex needs and/or additional support requirements that have been identified, and the additional support or reasonable adjustments that you have put in place and agreed with the Participant. This will form part of your evidence of two-way conversation and action planning. This evidence will be subject to validation and audit, and must be retained in line with ESF (England only) document retention.

38. Not all Participants with life events/personal circumstances/ health issues/disability will require support.

39. Participants may have one or multiple reasons why they require support. Support offered should be tailored to individual needs.

40. It is possible that support will need to be put in place on a short, medium or long term basis, according to a Participant’s circumstances and requirements and that Participants may move in and out of situations where they do/do not require support.

Proactive Disclosure where a Participant has complex needs and or additional support requirements

41. Participants who have complex needs and/or additional support requirements may be at greater risk of abuse or neglect. They may be unable to take care of themselves or protect themselves against significant harm or exploitation.

42. They may have difficulties dealing with DWP and provider processes which could affect their welfare and well-being and/or that of their family. They may find it difficult to gain access to your services because of, for example:

• learning difficulties
• physical disabilities
• mental illness
• age
• restrictions due to Covid-19.

This list is not exhaustive.

43. It is important you have policies in place which assist in the protection of vulnerable adults from:

• physical abuse
• sexual abuse
• exploitation.

Children and Complex Needs - defined

44. For the purposes of this guidance, a child is defined as a person under the age of 18. Because of their age all children are classed as having complex needs/additional support requirements. It is important you have policies in place which assist in the protection of children from:

• physical abuse
• sexual abuse
• exploitation.

Proactive Disclosure –providing information to third parties without a Participant or individuals consent

45. If you are satisfied that a child or adult with complex needs/additional support requirements faces clear and significant risks to their welfare or safety, you are explicitly empowered by DWP policy and relevant legislation (where you are acting as a data processor for DWP) to undertake any reasonable steps which you feel are necessary to address these risks.

46. This includes, for example, concerns about:

• risk of injury
• ill treatment
• neglect
• physical or sexual abuse
• exploitation of children or adults. The expectation is that action will be taken without undue delay.

This list is not exhaustive.

47. You should volunteer information which is directly relevant to the issue of concern to Social Services or the Police as appropriate, with or without the Participant’s consent.

48. In the case of a child, such information may be provided without the consent of the parents or guardian if a child’s welfare is at risk. You do not have to have to tell the parents or guardian about the disclosure. You should alert your management to any such disclosure.

49. Any information given must be factual or relevant. You should provide the facts of the case and your concerns to the relevant body and only provide personal information such as name and address once they have confirmed they can take the issue forward.

50. On some occasions Social Services may ask you to tell the Participant that you have informed Social Services and that they have to disclose the source of allegations made to them. There is, however, no obligation for you to inform the Participant that you have approached Social Services. If you have concerns that disclosure of your details would put your own safety as risk, you do not have to disclose any further details.

Detailed background and further information

51. DWP may identify some claimants as having complex needs and/or as requiring additional support to enable them to access and use benefits and services.

52. The DWP approach to supporting these claimants is based upon assessment of the impact of life events, personal circumstances, or health conditions on an individual’s ability to access and use benefits and services, and addressing these to ensure that their Participant journey is comparable in quality and outcome to that of Participants who have no complex needs or additional support requirements.

53. DWP may identify any Participant as having complex needs and/or requiring additional support depending upon their situation.

54. Because of their age, a Participant who is under 18 is automatically considered to have complex needs and/or require additional support.

Obtaining a Participant Signature

55. Where you are required to obtain a Participant signature, WHP is not prescriptive about how any required signature is obtained (with the exception of any signature that is required for ESF purposes).

56. Providers should follow government guidelines on restrictions and customer’s preferences/needs when considering any Face-to-Face activity.

57. It is your responsibility for any (ESF Match Funded Participant) that you follow the latest ESF guidelines and that ESF regulations take precedence to ensure you meet all evidence requirements. Please also refer to Chapter 11b: ESF requirements 2014 to 2020 (England only) - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk) including paragraphs 72 – 75 for electronic signatures information.

58. For more information regarding obtaining a Participant Signature, please refer to Chapter 1: Introduction and Overview - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk) section titled ‘Obtaining a Participant Signature’ which also includes more information regarding signature expectations and ESF requirements.

Please note: Now that all COVID-19 restrictions have been lifted and you have moved back to face-to-face delivery, all documents which require a Participant’s signature should be signed and dated by the Participant. For Non-ESF participants if the signature box is annotated ‘COVID- 19’ or ‘REMOTE DELIVERY’ you are not required to obtain a signature retrospectively when they are seen in person.

Should you require a copy of any of the forms mentioned in this chapter, please email: WHP.ENQUIRIES@DWP.GSI.GOV.UK