25066 CCC and PCC Individual Service Funds

Cambridgeshire County Council is inviting applications to join our DPS for Individual Service Funds Framework. Cambridgeshire County Council will be able to call-off the DPS.

Individual Service Funds (ISFs) were formally introduced in the Care Act (2014), as an option for commissioning self-directed support. They are a mechanism by which a person's personal budget, agreed by a Social Worker, can be held by a third party organisation (i.e. neither by the County Council nor the person) who is a trusted organisation accredited by the County Council to help the person find the care and support they need in the local community, be it access to Homecare, Day Services, a Personal Assistant (PA), equipment needs, live-in care, social prescribing or signposting to other services and voluntary organisations that will help them achieve their agreed outcomes, or indeed a combination of all of the above. It is a form of Self-Directed Support.

ISFs are particularly appropriate when people do not feel confident enough or have the capacity to manage the financial and employer responsibilities of a Direct Payment on their own but still prefer to exercise personal choice and control over how their agreed care and support needs are met. Some people who receive a Direct Payment may prefer the support of a local approved ISF Broker who can assist the person with support to plan their activities and care but would not themselves hold the budget responsibility this is why the ISF service requirements include separate clauses relating to:

-providers delivering care and brokerage support (Lot 1 of the ISF Dynamic Purchasing System), and

-providers brokering care and support delivered by other providers (Lot 2 of the ISF Dynamic Purchasing System).

This is a re-advertising of 21129 CCC & PCC Individual Service Funds (The original notice cannot be updated due to a technical error).