Description
As a Call Companion, you will make regular telephone calls to an older person experiencing loneliness and isolation. These calls provide a lifeline of friendship for our older people, and the regular, warm, friendly chats and companionship provide a vital link with the outside world from which they have become isolated.
Over time, you and the older person you have been matched with will get to know each other well and together you will spend many hours full of fun, laughter and stories.
You will need two references and to complete an ID check for this role.
Tasks include:
- Calling the older person you have been matched with two to four times per month at an agreed time.
- Following the guidance in your call companion training modules to ensure that your calls are enjoyable, appropriate and in line with our charitable aims.
- Keeping in regular contact with your call companion coordinator and letting them know how everything is going.
- Completing monthly online reports about your call companion calls.
Organisation aims and objectives
We exist to provide social connections for older people at a time in their lives when their social circles are diminishing. In 2020, 8,500 older guests were part of over 900 regular social gatherings across the UK, supported by 14,000 volunteers. However, in response to the COVID-19 crisis we suspended these social gatherings and created a new telephone befriending service for older people called call companions. As well as making sure that all those already receiving our support get a regular phone call throughout the lockdown, we are offering a call companion to anyone else of this generation who lives alone or in sheltered housing and feels lonely or isolated. We plan to make call companions a permanent addition to our work and will continue to run this new service alongside our social gatherings when things get back to normal.
Availability
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Flexible - contact your older person two to four times per month.
Restrictions
Experience required: We are looking for Call Companions with the following skills and attributes:
- Good conversation skills
- An enthusiasm for speaking on the phone and making connections remotely
- A friendly, empathetic approach
- The ability to really listen to people
- Patience
- A passion for improving the lives of lonely and isolated older people
- The ability to volunteer as part of a mutually supportive team of call companions
- Basic computer literacy (including the ability to use email)
Travel details: Can be completed from the comfort of your home.
Minimum age: 18