. advice

quality mark

Systems and infrastructure

East Hackney LAW has an emphasis on quality.

We have successfully obtained the Community Legal Service Quality Mark (CLS) the Office of the Immigration Services Commissioner (OISC) and the Immigration Law Practitioners Association (ILPA).

We continue to monitor and implement policies, procedures and systems, consolidating work associated with the Community Legal Service Quality Mark.

We work hard to ensure a culture of 'best practice' is maintained and where possible appropriate built on.

How we monitor our work.

As part of maintaining the Community Legal Service quality mark we audit the:

• Project case management systems
  
• Quality of the advice provision
  
• Outcomes/outputs
  
• Project's commitment to consult with clients

This process enables us to track changes and measure whether we are delivering agreed outputs, or not.

Monitoring methods used to ensure the project is meeting aims and addressing client needs include recording client data in case files. These detail the:

• Gender
  
• Age
  
• Ethnicity
  
• Disability
  
• Home base
  
• GP surgery registered with
  
• Nature of enquiry/case
  
• Length of usage, attendance
  
• Referrals used to other organisations
  
• Outcomes.
  

Case files monitor a client's progress in detail. The project case files are audited every month.
Formal feedback is gathered from clients, agencies (including health professional's, tenants groups etc) and groups working with difficult to reach people. The feedback includes:

• Data from client file statistics correlated quarterly
  
• An annual questionnaire
  
• Feedback sheets
  
• Suggestion box
  
• Meetings with organisations
  

This information is collected and presented by the Practice Manager and scrutinised in detail by Hackney Marsh Partnership Management Committee.
Informal feedback includes:

• Conversation with users, volunteers and staff/ committee members of organisations
  
• Written feedback collected by senior staff (including the Project Manager).
  Positive indicators include
  
• Evidence of numbers of people using the service (gender, age, ethnicity, geographical area, disability). This includes people from 'hard to reach' people groups, and first time users (indicating if we are helping people access advice)
  
• The increased income obtained on behalf of clients (welfare benefits obtained/ debt stopped/re-scheduled).
  
• The number of successful outcomes contrasted with failing outcomes (welfare benefits, tribunal work, county court).
  

The HMP management committee receives a monthly update and a detailed summary of client monitoring statistics (including geographical area, ethnicity, and types of cases/outcomes and quantities) each quarter. This enables the committee (including community representatives) and Practice Manager to evaluate the actual service provided against targets/outputs. From this, adjustments are made to the service.

Volunteers, staff clients and management committee are involved in the annual review.
An annual questionnaire is used as part of an annual review process, completed by users and non-users. It explores 2 areas:

• The perception of the service
  
• The quality of the service
  It provides space for comment and ideas to improve the service. The questionnaire is for clients and volunteers (it is available, completed and returned during advice sessions), however it also targets people who do not use the service. This is achieved by 'door-to-door' work and using the questionnaire in youth clubs, centres, and bus stops.
  
• These formal questionnaires emphasise the significance of listening to people in the neighbourhood.
  
• We recognise that people living locally know a lot about the subtle and complex issues and problems related to area.
  
• People in the neighbourhood also know about issues and problems related to the advice service.
  

This process is on-going ensuring the service reaches objectives.

Finally a key indication of the performance of East Hackney LAW includes participation and reflecting on that participation; challenges which people can rise to with appropriate support / training / fun. These factors continue to be monitored to ensure the 'process' of developing the service is as equally helpful to people as the service, which develops from East Hackney LAW.

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