Once you submit your application to the Home Office, the Community Sponsorship team will check to make sure you’ve submitted all of your additional documents. They may come back to you with some clarifying questions (this is perfectly normal and happens to most Community Sponsorship Groups). They will then get in touch to schedule your…
Stage of the process: We have submitted our application
Preparing a fact sheet for the family you will support
Once you’ve been allocated a family, and you and your Local Authority have accepted them, you will need to prepare a fact sheet that will be shared with the family your group will be welcoming. This is your opportunity to introduce yourselves, the support you are offering, and information about the area they will be living in. We’ve…
Providing a tenancy agreement
When you are searching for suitable accommodation for the family you will welcome through Community Sponsorship, you should think through how you will ensure the family feel ownership of the property. Whether you are renting a property directly with a private landlord, or purchasing the property, it’s essential that a tenancy agreement is in place between…
Receiving the personal data of refugees
As a Community Sponsor, you will receive personal data of the refugees that are allocated to your group. This will help you decide whether you can meet the needs of the family that is allocated to you. The information you will receive is extremely confidential and will contain the ages, genders, biographic information and medical…
Working with Jobcentres
All adult refugees who are resettled via Community Sponsorship will be entitled to claim benefits, and as a Community Sponsorship Group, it’s recommended that you find out as much as possible in your research to complete your application form. You will be working in the abstract (you won’t know the composition or size of the…
Working with schools
If the family you support have school-aged children, you will need to help them register their children in local schools within the first two weeks of arrival as part of your sponsor obligations. When you wrote your application, you will have researched the school registration process. However, once you know the make-up of the family,…
Carrying out Police Board Consultation
In order to protect the refugee family you will be welcoming from harm, and to ensure their new neighbourhood is safe to live in, the Home Office ask you to have your local police check the area you find accommodation in. Your Safer Neighbourhood Policing Team (or equivalent) will be able to provide a view…
Considering the impact of trauma
Reset has asked Shellee Burroughs, Clinical Operations Manager at Action for Child Trauma (ACT) International to put together these resources in order to provide some information about trauma in the Community Sponsorship context. As a Community Sponsorship Group, your role is never to diagnose or treat trauma, but to signpost the refugees you support to…
Defining boundaries and your support
It may seem a little strange to set boundaries on the way in which you work with refugees. Afterall, you got into Community Sponsorship in order to provide practical support to those arriving in the UK. However, spending time defining the way in which your group will operate and what a refugee family can expect…
Supporting a family with medical needs
Under the UK Resettlement Scheme (UKRS), there may be a greater demand for resettlement places for those with medical needs. We know that this might cause you some concern about how you might support the family, but it’s important to think through whether your concern is warranted. ‘Medical need’ is a very broad description; you could…
The Group’s role in the accommodation of a refugee family
This resource aims to help your Community Sponsorship Group think through some key issues relating to housing for when you will welcome a refugee family into the UK. It may be that you choose to apply for approval in principle from the Home Office without accommodation, however, it’s important to discuss your housing strategy as a Group…