We’d like to take this opportunity to say a huge thank you to all our volunteers, and to share that we are looking for new recruits to join the team!
We have continued giving advice to those in need throughout the Coronavirus pandemic thanks to the tireless dedication of our volunteers and staff. At the start of lockdown, our team quickly rallied to ensure we could still help as many people as possible over the phone or webchat.
We have almost 100 volunteers currently working from home, as well as 49 staff. Our volunteers contribute nearly 730 hours each week on average; since the start of lockdown they have supported almost 6,000 clients to date, with more than 14,000 issues including benefits, employment, debt and housing*.
During Volunteers’ Week we are recognising all our volunteers through the whole of the last year, not only those who are able to work with us during this exceptional time. From April 2019-March 2020, we helped more than 33,500 people with more than 80,000 problems, and we couldn’t have done this without the support of our volunteers.
We spoke to volunteer Dennis, who has been volunteering at Citizens Advice Crawley for the last ten years. Dennis is a Level 2 adviser meaning he can help a high number of clients with advice and information. He also supports clients to fill in forms such as benefit applications, among other tasks.
Prior to Citizens Advice, Dennis’s background was in engineering and he believes this has helped him in his advice role. He told us this about his experience:
‘I believe that, like most engineers, this gives me an analytical approach to problem solving although my learning curve was, and still is, steep.
I enjoy webchat and I was happy to volunteer to work at home during the pandemic.
Thanks for all the support that I have received during my time with Citizens Advice.’
Emma Cross, Chief Executive Officer, said:
‘Throughout the year our wonderful volunteers contribute their time and energy to make a huge difference to people’s lives and help keep our vital service running.
Whether they have been able to continue in their role recently, or have paused their volunteering, their support throughout the year has been truly invaluable. I cannot thank them enough for their continued dedication. We really couldn’t do it without them!
We’re encouraging new volunteers to apply and join us at a time when our service is so needed by the community.’
We are recruiting volunteers for a number of roles; if you don’t think being an adviser is for you, there are other non-advice-giving roles available including Case Studies and Stories Coordinator, and Funding Bid Development Assistant.
If you’re interested in finding out more and applying, please click here.
*March 16th-June 1st, 2020
