Pre-stage one delays

[Helenahandkart]

After lots of fact-finding last year at the start of January we had a two hour Zoom meeting with a SW from our LA agency, and went through their preliminary questions about us. SW told us that she would put together a report from the meeting and send it to us, at which point we could submit the ROI. The timescale for this was 5 days. It’s now almost 4 weeks later and we still haven’t had the report. I’ve chased it once but don’t want to put her back up. I understand from reading other people’s posts that delays are to be expected at every stage. I guess we’re just trying to gauge how much we should be chasing them up at this point.

My medical records state that I had a short period of serious drug use about 25 years ago. I knew there was no point in trying to hide this so we discussed it in the meeting and it didn’t appear to be an insurmountable issue. However, I’m now wondering whether we’re being rejected and that’s why no one is sending us the ROI forms etc. Any thoughts please?

I think you need to push politely now - I would call up and just say you’re enquiring about it all. I would ring up once a week till you get a response personally - they may be swamped - but it is their job and they wouldn’t take the time to do the interview to be honest and then not even follow up!

I too would follow it up and maybe ask what their realistic timescales currently are. They’ve had almost a year of Covid to get some idea of how long things are generally taking. I would have thought that out of politeness they would have told you if 5 days was likely to be several weeks due to Covid etc but sometimes that’s the way SWs can be. Please don’t assume that just because you haven’t heard anything then you’ve been rejected. If you aren’t what they are looking for then try another agency

That's frustrating. We had our initial call and were told 10 working days and she in fact sent it to us after 9. Personally we would be reconsidering our option of agency in your position. I'm totally okay with delays. It is often not preventable and they do complex roles but I'm not okay with poor communication. They could have simply let you you know that timelines have changed.

We had our initial call with the sw mid December, she submitted her report the next day and we got the info pack with the roi form a few days before Christmas. We submitted it last week.

I'd definitely chase

Thanks everyone. I’m really aware that everything we do from now on is being judged, so I didn’t want to be too pushy or too laid back (I may be overthinking this!)
I’ll start a weekly schedule of firm but friendly reminders, and hope they get on with it soon.

After the initial discussion I was told 2 weeks and they would send the ROI I never got a copy of the report which she was sending to her manager. But I did get the ROI and currently in the midst of all the checks and waiting for a social worker to be allocated

Well I chased it up yesterday and today the report arrived - it had been ‘mislaid’ apparently!
I told them in the meeting that we were finishing up a kitchen renovation. Originally I was told that all building work needed to be finished before the house assessment at the beginning of stage 2, but in the report it says that we need to have finished the house before we can even register our interest. This seems crazy, as we have months and months of assessment ahead of us during which I was planning to finish the work (the house renovation is my full time job atm). It seems like a pointless delay.

I’m starting to wonder if we will ever be accepted for stage 1. We had a meeting with a new SW today. It now appears as though the renovation work isn’t an issue, but my history is.
Despite being told by everyone so far that my brief drug use when I was a teenager/ early 20s would not hinder our application, SW today told us that she felt that, even if we were approved, the child’s SW would read our PAR and reject us immediately because of it. She seemed to be suggesting that they were unlikely to accept us onto stage 1 because it would be a waste of their resources to go through the process with us.
I’m incredibly frustrated by this. In nearly all respects we are (I think) really strong candidates and have a lot to offer a child - both practically and emotionally. Given that social services are in the business of giving children second chances, it seems shortsighted that they can’t accept that an adopter may have had a difficult start but subsequently managed to turn their life round.
She also said that she wouldn’t consider us for siblings because it would be too stressful, and I had exhibited ‘poor coping strategies’ in my teenage years.
I had several years of counselling in my 20s and ever since have been living a very stable calm life for the last 25 years. Even after 9 unsuccessful rounds of IVF I didn’t resort to any ‘poor coping strategies’!
I feel as though we’re being written off based on a couple of brief Zoom meetings.
Surely they can’t be so inundated with potential adopters that they can afford to dismiss us out of hand?! Is this a way of testing our resolve?

It sounds like they are stalling. Once you have submitted your ROI there are specific time frames they have to work within for approval so that is why potential adopters are sometimes told to hold off submitting it until the SWs are ready to set that clock ticking. I actually thought that they could have too many adopter applications for them to handle before I read the part where you said Surely they can’t be so inundated with potential adopters that they can afford to dismiss us out of hand?! and I think in fact that could be the case. From memory the cost of assessing adopters (not sure if it's per adopter or per couple) is about £2,000, so they will only invest in you if they feel there is a good chance of you being matched at the end of it, and if they have limited resources for assessing adopters and/or fewer children being placed for adoption at the moment then they will be putting their resources into the adopters who they think they will have the most success with. They haven't said 'no', but it really sounds like they are hedging their bets at this stage.

You could either sit it out in the hope that they say yes, or go away and leave it for a year and hope that things have quietened down. You could even ask if there is anything you could do in that time to make your application stronger. It may simply be box ticking, but it does tend to go in your favour if they ask you to do something and you do it. The other option is to start looking at other local authorities/agencies if there are any others near you. If I were in your shoes I would be looking down that route.

Many, many people try drugs as teenagers and young adults, most grow out of it into adulthood. It really does depend on the nature of the drug use, the drugs involved, how long etc. For example someone using recreational drugs in the weekend would be very different than someone who used heroin for a couple of years. Obviously I’m not asking you to share your experiences but some types of drug use might be considered problematic years down the line.

Is the agency you’ve enquired with a voluntary agency or local authority? If it’s a third sector one I’d approach your local authority who are more likely to be understanding of historic drug use - private/third sector tend to be quite picky because they don’t get paid fully until you’re matched so have a vested interest in “easy” assessments.

Thank you both for your replies.
We are trying to register with our local authority as we felt that they would be more likely to accept us. we obviously underestimated just how undesirable we are!
Unfortunately my drug use, although very short-lived, was more the serious than the recreational type, and they obviously think there's a possibility I could go off the rails again (there really isn't!).

We have had an email from them this afternoon saying that they want us to reconsider over the next few weeks while we're finishing our kitchen refurb, and if we still want to adopt with them we need to resubmit our ROI, but that it would be on the understanding that they still might not accept it, and if they did the assessment process is likely to be extremely in-depth and longwinded. They're definitely stalling and/or trying to put us off.

I thought my history would be a concern so I told them about it right from the beginning - they all told me it wasn't an insurmountable issue. It's a bit upsetting that they have waited so long to decide it's a big problem.
Hopefully this is just an obstacle, and tenacity will win the day.

Are you near a neighbouring local authority? Where I am I’m local to four different council areas so could apply to any one of them - all with slightly different criteria. Is it a possibility to register interest with a different one, which will give you an idea of whether they’re stalling, trying to put you off or trying to test your determination (sadly some agencies aren’t above that kind of nonsense).

All our local agencies are part of a regional agency. We’ve applied to the regional one and have already been pre-assessed by two of the local authorities out of the four that make up the regional agency. I don’t know if we can move to one of the other local authorities, as we would still be within the same regional agency, if that makes sense?

They seem to do the initial assessment with whichever one of the four has a spare SW that day, and then move you to your local one once you get further into the process, which is where we’re at now.

but that it would be on the understanding that they still might not accept it, and if they did the assessment process is likely to be extremely in-depth and longwinded.

The assessment is extremely in depth and long winded anyway, I’m a social worker with a specialism in trauma and my assessment took forever and took apart every aspect of my life, so that’s a ridiculous thing to say. I’m sure you didn’t expect to turn up and be handed a child.

I’d use the time during your refurb to get your evidence together. For example, get together information about what was happening at the time, how you came to get involved with drugs, any support or treatment you went through, anything that evidences significant change etc etc. When you’re ready I’d resubmit your ROI, if they continue to refuse you’d, I’d ask for written confirmation of that including their reasons and I’d start working my way up the chain. It’s discriminatory practice, they don’t know what was involved in the drug use, how you’ve changed since then.

To be honest, if most people were assessed on the basis of their coping strategies as a teenager they’d not be given a goldfish to care for, never mind a child. You sound open and reflective, you’ve clearly done a huge amount of work on yourself, which will pay dividends in caring for children. Try not to get discouraged, but be prepared to really argue your case.

Thank you, that’s excellent advice, and reassuring to hear from a SW who’s seen the process from both sides.
My late teens/ early 20s were pretty tumultuous, with very little in the way of support, and given the opportunity I’ll be able to give valid and detailed reasons for how my life fell apart, and I how I pulled myself together again. I just hope that I get the chance to explain myself before they reject me.
Thank you for taking the time to answer me.