Tameside Direct Payments

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• What is Direct Payments?
• Who can get Direct Payments ?
• How can I get Direct Payments?
• What support can I get to manage my Direct Payments?
• Support Group

What is Direct Payments?

Direct Payments are an alternative to traditional care and support services. Adult Services provide cash payments for individuals to purchase services that meet their assessed care needs.  This gives the person receiving services more choice and control over how their care needs are met. 

Direct Payments users/customers can choose to employ their own care worker(s) known as Personal Assistants or contract an agency that they have selected or a combination of the two.  Some Direct Payments customers choose to have Direct Payments to meet some of their needs while traditional services meet the rest.

Who can get Direct Payments?

Most people who are assessed as needing care or support services by Adult Services are eligible for Direct Payments. This includes;

• Parents of disabled children
• Older people and disabled people over 18 years old
• People with a physical impairment or condition
• Someone with a mental health diagnosis
• Adults with a learning disability

There are a few exclusions to accessing Direct Payments.

How can I get Direct Payments?

If you are already receiving care or support from Adult Services and would like to look at Direct Payments as an alternative to meet some or all of your needs, contact your Social Worker or Care Coordinator to discuss this. 

If you are not receiving care or support from Adult Services but think you are in need of them, contact the Adult Assessment and Customer Care Team.

Once your assessment is complete, your Social Worker or Care Coordinator will make a referral to the Direct Payments Team who will visit you to discuss Direct Payments in more detail and how it can work for you.

The Direct Payments Team will provide information on all aspects of Direct Payments. You will be required to open a separate bank account for your Direct Payments money to go into. You will be required to sign an agreement with Adult Services that will state what your responsibilities and the councils responsibilities are with regards to your Direct Payments.

What support can I get to manage my Direct Payments?

The Direct Payments Team will give you support and guidance on what you can and cannot do with your Direct payments money, how to recruit a Personal Assistant, how to be a fair employer, and many more things beside. If you decide at any point that you do not wish to pursue Direct Payments your Social Worker or Care Coordinator will put traditional services in place. 

We provide a free payroll service for any Direct Payments customer who employs a Personal Assistant. This makes paying a Personal Assistant much more hassle free: they work out the tax and National Insurance for you.

We work closely with the Direct Payments Finance Team who will support and train you to manage any of the Finance paperwork required by Tameside MBC.

If you need ongoing support to manage your Direct Payments, the Direct Payments Team will talk to you about who can support you with this. You can have as much support to manage your Direct Payments money as you need, as long as you are still in control.

Support Group

Tameside Direct Payments customers have their own support group; this is called the Tameside Mutual Support Group. They meet every month to chat to other Direct Payments customers and to provide support to each other as well as tackling some of the issues related to Direct Payments.

Contact Information
Send us a Message	Tameside Direct Payments Stalybridge Resource Centre Waterloo Road, Stalybridge SK15 2AU View local map
0161 342 2900
0161 342 2915