In January 2010 the team had recruited a Customer Involvement Officer to establish a service user group to assist in the design and delivery of supported housing and floating support services.

The group known as ‘Helping Hands’ was set up jointly by both the P&C (Planning and Commissioning (Housing Related)) team and the Leicester City Drug and Alcohol Action Team, who are also known as the DAAT. 

The group (who are very passionate and enthusiastic) meet up once a month.  They are made up of service users who are drawn from different services and bring a long a wide range of different skills and experiences

The Council has a duty to involve their service users in the design and delivery of their services; we believe that service users hold the key to improving the way we work as an organisation. Therefore we provide members of Helping Hands with relevant skills and training to get involve in the development of services such as becoming a customer representative on recruitment panels, involvement in service tenders and acting as mystery shoppers.

Service users also have the opportunity to be involved in the development of polices and procedures and in the design and development of the customer section of the Planning and Commissioning website.