Fostering in Hammersmith & Fulham, Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea and Westminster

Change a life, foster a child.

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Caring for children and young people who live in H&F, RBKC and Westminster

The Fostering Shared Services combines fostering in Hammersmith & Fulham, the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea and Westminster City Council. By bringing 3 local authorities together, we're able to pool our wealth of knowledge and resources to create better life chances for all our children and support our incredible foster carers.

Our service is rated as 'Outstanding' by Ofsted - we are a fostering community made up of truly passionate, caring and experienced social work staff and carers.

If you become a Fostering Shared Services foster carer, you become part of our team. Choosing to become one of our foster carers means that children and young people can remain geographically close to their family home. This means in most cases they can continue going to the same school or nursery, church or faith group and regularly see the friends they have made.

Fostering with your local council keeps children and young people who need foster care in the local community, in familiar surroundings which we know can provide a better outcome for them as they grow up.

Benefits, allowances and support

Foster carers in Hammersmith & Fulham, Kensington and Chelsea and Westminster receive a weekly allowance for each child placed in their care.

Weekly fees and allowances for our foster carers
Age of child or young person Allowance Fee Total
0 to 2 years £198 £242.93 440.93
3 to 4 years £201 £242.93 £443.93
5 to 10 years £225 £242.93 £467.93
11 to 15 years £257 £242.93 £499.93
16 to 17 £299 £242.93 £541.93

In addition to this allowance, Shared Services foster carers receive:

  • a council tax grant, irrespective of the borough they reside in
  • birthday and religious festival allowances
  • a summer holiday activities allowance
  • annual holiday grants to contribute towards the travel and accommodation costs for the child
  • loyalty bonus payments in recognition of long service
  • a reward of up to £750 when they refer a friend or family member who becomes a Shared Services foster carer
  • a Blue Light card which gives a range of discounts across restaurants, retail, travel and entertainment
  • a supervising social worker who will visit at least every six weeks to offer support and guidance
  • access to support groups for you and other members of your household
  • ongoing training to develop your skills and knowledge as a foster carer
  • access to an emergency duty team outside office hours
  • social events for foster carers over the course of the year
  • a bi-annual award ceremony
  • membership to the Fostering Network

Transfer to Fostering Shared Services

Already a foster carer and looking for a change? We’re always keen to hear from existing foster carers and we offer a fast-track service to make it easy for you to join us.

We work within the Fostering Network transfer of foster carers protocol to ensure that the transfer from your current agency to us is a smooth process for you and your current agency, ensuring continuity of care for any children in your care during the transfer.

You can only be registered with one fostering agency at a time, so once you have given written notice to your current agency of your intention to transfer, we will work with you to map out a timeframe for when you can transfer to our service.

We will need to undertake our own assessment, but with the information provided by your current agency, we hope to be able to complete the assessment within 8 weeks.

What are the steps to becoming a foster carer with H&F, RBKC and Westminster?

Step 1 - Make contact

Call Foster with West London on 020 8753 1075 or join us to hear more at one of our information sessions. During this initial call we will provide you with advice and support you to make a decision as to whether it is the right time for you to foster.

If you are ready to progress with your journey to becoming a foster carer, an initial enquiry will be completed over the phone to learn more about you and your family. If you meet the initial screening criteria, you will be passed to the local authority you want to foster for who will book an initial home visit and a member of the team will visit you.

Step 2 - Training

Attend our Skills-to-Foster 3-day course which will equip you with essential skills required to care for a vulnerable child or young person. Attendance at the course forms part of the assessment process and all applicants are required to attend. 

Depending on when the training course starts, you may be invited to attend the course before the assessment begins or during the assessment.

Step 3 - Assessment (Stage 1 and 2)

Once we have completed your initial enquiry and an initial home visit has been carried out, a decision will be made to progress to Stage 1.

Both you and your allocated worker will sign an Assessment Stage 1 agreement outlining the process involved. During the Assessment Stage 1 a number of checks, required by the government under the fostering regulations, will be undertaken which includes:

  • your local authority
  • probation
  • finance
  • employment
  • education

In addition to the above, we will complete personal references and education checks for your children. You will be expected to undertake a health assessment with your doctor. We will need to complete a Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) check on you, your partner and any members of your household who are over 18 years old.

We will also agree on a timeframe for this work to be undertaken. You will be offered the opportunity to undertake Skills-to-Foster training at this stage.

Upon completion of Assessment Stage 1, you will be allocated a social worker to carry out an assessment of your background, life experiences and the qualities you would bring to fostering.

This is called Assessment Stage 2 of the fostering process. This will be reviewed halfway through by the principal social worker within the team to check any plans that need to be put into place.

Step 4 - Approval

You will be invited to a Fostering Panel that will assess your application alongside the government fostering regulations and make a recommendation for your approval as a foster carer and the final decision will be made by the agency decision maker shortly after.

Step 5 - Post-approval

You will be enrolled on our payment system and allocated a supervising social worker who will help you prepare yourself and your home for a child or young person coming into your care, and your life as a foster  carer begins!

After one year, you will go back to a Fostering Panel which will review your first year as a foster carer.

Start today

If you would like further information, with no-obligation, please send us your details and one of our fostering team will get in touch with you.

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