First Contact Service
The First Contact Service is the ‘front door’
into the Cheshire East Family Service (
CEFS
), and provides
information, advice and guidance about services available to young
people, parents and practitioners.
First Contact also offers practical support
and guidance to practitioners who need help with Common Assessment
Frameworks (
CAF
)
or Lead Professional processes and with assessing and managing
interventions for children and young people with complex needs.
Where there are concerns about the safety of a
child or young person, enquirers will be transferred directly
through to the Children’s Assessment Team (
CAT
) in Children’s Social
Care.
Cheshire East Family Service (CEFS)
CEFS
has been
set up to ensure children and young people with additional needs
receive the right help at the right time.
CEFS
will deliver a range of
evidence based interventions to children and young people aged 0-19
on a locality basis. Services include Family Support and help with
parenting, and Family Service Workers will be available to work
especially with families with targeted and complex needs, and will
undertake the role of Lead Professional using Common Assessment
Framework (
CAF
)
where appropriate. Further services will be developed within our
four localities in consultation with partner agencies as well as
young people and parents. Introductory
Briefing Number 1 (PDF, 112KB) and Introductory
Briefing Number 2 (PDF, 158KB) about Cheshire East Family
Service is available to read here.
In order to help make sure children and young people receive the
right services at the right time, and in line with the
establishment of
CEFS
, new pathways have been
developed into
CEFS
and Children’s Social
Care. One Minute Guides have been designed to give more
information about Cheshire East
Family Service (PDF, 63KB) and First
Contact (PDF, 63KB). There is also a new form to
request services
from Cheshire East Family Service (CEFS) (MS Word, 505KB)
Below you can find some leaflets that explain the work of
CEFS
in more
detail:
Children and Families Resource Directory
Our Directory of services aims to help you to
access information and advice about services relevant to you and
your family.
Common Assessment Framework (CAF)
Sometimes for one reason or another a family
cannot resolve some of their problems and need extra help and
support. The sooner these problems can be identified the better it
is and this is where the Common Assessment Framework (
CAF
) can help. The
CAF
is a way of
working that is designed to help you at these times - it can make
problems easier to understand and quicker to solve.
Family Information Service (FIS)
FIS
is a free, impartial
one-stop-shop service for parents/carers and young people aged
0–19, providing accurate and detailed information on services
in Cheshire East, regionally and nationally. From childcare to
tax credits to guidance on bullying, the Family
Information Service can assist for all manner of queries, big
or small.
