CHARMS Social Care Community Newsroom

CHL is pleased to announce that birmingham City Council have decided to purchase CHARMS post adoption modules including : - Letterbox, - Adopter Allowances, - Access to Birth Records, - Inter Agancy Placements, - Post Adoption Support. For more information contact CHL on 0161 237 1872

CHL is pleased to announce that Argyll and Bute Council have purchased ETC and it went live on 9/3/2007. Ernie Brown, Training and Health and Safety Manager, Argyll and Bute Council said : ‘We have been looking to implement a dedicated training management package for some time and initially heard about ETC from a promotional flyer. After a demonstration late last year we were convinced. We are looking forward to all the benefits that ETC can provide – the first of which is getting all of our training records organised.’ Jim Moores, MD, CHL said : ‘It is probably the most scenic installation we have ever undertaken; a leisurely drive through Glasgow, past Loch Lomond and on down the A83 towards Campbeltown and you will get to Lochgilphead. Wow! The mountains, the sea, the people. I’m looking forward to the follow up visit to deliver advanced training.’ Notes for Editors Situated on the west coast of Scotland, Argyll and Bute is one of the most beautiful and diverse areas in Britain. Argyll and Bute Council covers the second largest geographical area of any Scottish local authority, stretching for over 100 miles from Appin in the north to Campbeltown in the south and more than 80 miles across from the island of Tiree in the west to Helensburgh in the east. It has six towns, 25 inhabited islands and over 2,700 miles of coastline. The Training Team is based at the Clydesdale Bank Building, Poltalloch Street, Lochgilphead, Argyll, PA31 8LP and you can contact Liz Perkins, Training Officer on 01546 604 051. Computing Help Limited, based in Manchester, now has some 500 sites around the UK using its social care systems. They range from Government Departments and large Private Sector organisations to independent care providers with one or two staff. CHL has become the foremost provider of Adoption and Fostering and Supported Employment software in the UK.

With Jenny Dutton and Phil Dillon-Thistleton CHL is pleased to announce that NE London has now passed the 150 mark for NMDS-SC returns. Using CHL's unique WAN system - which costs just £25.00 per year - more than 150 care providers have now submitted their NMDS return. WAN version 4 now, automatically fills in the Excel version of the NMDS-SC. The lucky organisations that have WAN can now complete their NMDS-SC return in less than 2 minutes. WAN is the most easy to use workforce development system around. It allows the user to manage all staff training, qualification, contact information and much more. Many organisations have purchased WAN themselves to manage staff development on a day to day basis. In North East London over 240 care providers now have WAN and here are some of their comments : “CRB/First aid tracking getting staff development on system and putting it all together.” - Real Life Parenting, Newham “The software was installed successfully. I'm sure it will enhance staff and volunteer record keeping within the organisation. The software will be useful for the organisation and volunteer records including staff development training documentation.” - Stratford Learning Zone aka EXCEL Learning Zone “It's great!” - Eastbrook House “Pleased with training - understood how to input data.I feel this system is very beneficial.” - Pre School Learning Alliance “very keen to use system as they are a brand new organisation who are struggling to report back even to their own headoffice at present.Left a WAN cd with the owner for onward transmission to his IT manager as they want to install at their stratford site” - Windwood Lodge Care Home, Redbridge. “Hope to get full supoort in developing our care staff. Support as with the CSCI Inspection” - APASENTH Home & Community Care, Tower Hamlets. “Can really see the benefit and once the data is in it will be an asset.” - Excelcare Holdings, Tower Hamlets. “Like the report feature helpfulfeature - will be used to record worker essential details excellent training” - Spark Centre (The), Tower Hamlets. “Impressed” - Lifecare Consulting, Waltham Forest. “The training was made easy to understand and enjoyable” – Touchsky, Waltham Forest. “Extremely good value for money at £25- per annum. If it handled staff tracking we would be able to give up our existing database and just use WAN.” - Greenwich Toy Library “I am very keen for TLC to be part of this workforce development programme, as it links in with developments and improvements we are making within the organization.” - Stuart Hornsby, Chief Executive, TLC Care Services “Very useful - will save a lot of time. All in one package” - Alyson House, Southend “Very useful and would like to use the system as main personnel system, will renew after 12 months” - Age Concern Newham “Very interesting and useful software will enable me to monitor and schedule training and have staff information at my fingertips” - Waltham Forest Disability Resource Centre “Very excited by the prospects of this new system. It is a vast improvement on our current paper and spread sheet based data. It will save considerable time implementing the NMDS questionnaire” - Essex care Consortium “Thought it was very useful as their existing HR system is inaccessible to most of their staff”.- Estuary Housing Association “Very Helpful system which will cut down my paperwork” - Eight Ash Court, Essex “I can see the potential of the system and it will be interesting to see how we as a team can benefit from it, particularly with regard to accessing training” - Charles Dickens Court Day Centre “Save time, easy access to information” - Pat Shaw House, Excelcare “Very excited about the whole project and eager to go ahead and use the system” - The Princess Royal Lewisham Carers Centre “Easy to use and will input all staff” - Age Concern Havering “Thinks the system will be a very useful internal database”.- Immaculate Healthcare Services Limited “The software was installed successfully. I'm sure it will enhance staff and volunteer record keeping within the organization. “ - Stratford Learning Zone aka EXCEL Learning Zone “It’s a brilliant little system!We will get immediate benefit.The record card is just like a CV and the reports will be very useful” VT, Hackney “We have all been really impressed with the WAN system and are sure it will prove really useful to our organisation.One staff member has just had an appraisal as part of her management NVQ and printing out her staff record card was really useful piece of evidence to show the assessor in a simple and straightforward way” OWFA, Stratford “This will be very useful to our care home, to log information for training management personnel details for staff. Really looking forward to using it.” Cavell Lodge, Leigh on Sea. “I found it really easy to use and of great help to us in recording staff info.It is a good system which was helped by having such a good teacher to install it for us!We thank you for giving us the opportunity to pilot this scheme.” Cavell Lodge, Essex “Yes, we would love the latest update to WAN. I would like to ask about the “archiving function” (when staff have left) - Is there a way we can get a report of those who have been archived, as I believe the auditors like to see such detail. It is also useful for reference request, as you have the dates of employment easily on hand without going through the filing.” – Essex Care Consortium For more information please ringh 0870 112 0421 and ask for Jim or Diane.

13th, 14th and 15th November CHL was represented at the ACTAN Conference, Douglas, Isle of Man, by Jim Moores, MD and Chris Clough, ETC Project Manager. It was a huge success with over 200 delegates attending. Our thanks to ACTAN for giving us the opportunity to attend. For more information about ACTAN please visit http://www.actan.org.uk

At 9/11/2006 NE London sub region has had 103 data files returned. We are on target to reach 250 installations by15th December 2006 and meet our NMDS-SC target. Well done all of those care organisations who have taken part so far. For those that are waiting please make sure you contact CHL for your copy of WAN. Using the unique WAN system which costs just £25.00 per year, Social Care organisations in North East London are able to maintain up-to-date staff, training and qualification records; and on the click of a button complete the NMDS-SC return. To order your copy of WAN (free for the first year ) just ring 0870 112 0421 .