Meet Dianne, our trainee adviser

VOLUNTEERS are an integral part the Citizens Advice service.

At Citizens Advice Wokingham we have more than 60 volunteers covering a variety of roles at least one session a week.

I often stress that there is no set experience required to join Citizens Advice as a volunteer. We have a number of roles and have sometimes created one around an individual’s skill set.

As well as highlighting our fantastic volunteers in The Wokingham Paper,

I encourage you to visit our website www.citizensadvicewokingham.org. uk or more information and contact details.

We will have more open days throughout May for people interested in volunteering with us, for a behindthe-scenes tour and presentation from our Training Manager.

This week we meet Dianne Smith, one of our volunteers in a Trainee Adviser role.

What is your role?

I’m a Volunteer Adviser. It’s my job to give advice to clients when they have problems, and I can look at a wide range of things. We explore the issue, work out what the options are and give the clients advice on their next steps to resolve that problem, whatever it may be.

Is it your job to simply advise?

Obviously, the ultimate goal is to solve somebody’s problem, but quite often the problem is complex and you can’t always solve it in one advice session, or one meeting. If that’s the case, then you would give them the advice over a series of appointments.

Sometimes you have people with different capabilities to be able to sort things out themselves, and often it may just be that somebody can’t access the Internet, or they have learning difficulties, or something like that.

You may just be holding someone’s hand to take them through finding the information, or filling in a form, and those situations are easy to sort.

In more complex cases, you might have to refer them to a specialist, like an Employment adviser or a solicitor, or they might need an immigration appointment. It really depends on what the problem is, and what the person needs.

It’s always better if you can equip someone with the tools to be able to help themselves, but not everybody can and things can be really complicated, sometimes even for people who know the system.

Have you volunteered in other positions here?

Initially, I was working here as an admin volunteer to get information and feedback from people who had used the service.

The collected data was used when we applied for the funding from Wokingham Borough Council, so that the council had the information from clients such that they could decide whether they thought it was worthwhile to keep supporting us.

Some data came through surveys that clients completed after they’d had an appointment, but the majority was through telephone calls to people who had used the service in the previous month.

That was overwhelmingly positive, and it was incredible to see the feedback that people gave, how appreciative they were, and the range of situations that people find themselves in that you might never expect.

Is Citizens Advice Wokingham moving forward in terms of publicity and presence?

I definitely think that the new management have succeeded in shaking things up and breathing new energy into Citizens Advice here in Wokingham.

Some of the changes are subtle; the waiting room is more welcoming and friendly, and there’s the column in The Wokingham Paper, so that people can see that Citizens Advice is here.

From talking to friends and family, I definitely think there’s an awareness that Citizens Advice is changing.

I still think there’s more that could be done to raise the profile of the service, because I’m not sure that people understand the breadth of knowledge and the range of topics that Citizens Advice can help people with. It’s vast, and there are so many people here with fantastic experience, and whether it’s benefits, housing [etc.], these are all quite complex things.

A vast amount of benefits, for example, don’t get claimed because people don’t know that they’re entitled to them. When you’re already in an emotional state or you have other vulnerabilities, then having someone to take you through it is a good service.

What would you say to people who aren’t sure whether the service is right for them or not?

Sometimes there’s a perception that people who come to Citizens Advice are ‘just benefit-scroungers’, and it’s really not like that at all. Anyone could have a problem; it could be me next week, or you. Citizens Advice is for everyone!

There’s no stigma to using it: it’s just a person with a problem.

You can get help and advice from your local Citizens Advice or visit www.citizensadvicewokingham.org. uk or visit Second Floor, Waterford House, Erfstadt Court, Wokingham RG40 2YF. Tel: 0300 330 1189. email: public@citizensadvicewokingham.org.uk