*Trigger warning – this article contains mentions of sexual assault and rape within the context of support services* 

For day two of #volunteersweek we are sharing an example of volunteering that is happening from homes across Bristol and beyond, where volunteers are making a real difference to the lives of people at some of their hardest moments. 

SARSAS offers support to people affected by rape, or any kind of sexual assault or abuse, at any time in their lives and their motto is to listen, believe and support. Last year SARSAS supported 4316 people, a significant number that it wouldn’t be possible to reach without the commitment of their Helpline Support Worker volunteers.  

‘Thank you so much to all our wonderful Helpline volunteers!  Without you we could not run our vital Helpline services. Through our Helpline and Live Chat you have provided directly accessible support to anyone affected by sexual violence and abuse.  

You have given your time to take 2603 calls and 632 Live Chats over the last year.  These numbers represent significant support to many people whose lives you will have made better. 

We could not be more grateful, and I’m looking forward to seeing lots of you at our Volunteer’s Week celebration later today!’ - Clare Havard, Volunteer and Helpline Services Manager at SARSAS 

Helpline volunteers answer calls on the SARSAS helpline and provide emotional support and signposting information. Many of these volunteers work from home, but all also have the option to work from the central hub in Bristol – meaning the volunteering opportunity is inclusive of those people not wanting to, or able to, travel and those who feel more comfortable volunteering from home. Since the pandemic this has been beneficial to an increasing number of volunteers with long covid, including one of our Voscur’s Skills 4 Social Purpose programme alumni who went on to volunteer with SARSAS.  

There are of course risks to volunteering from home, and in the case of volunteering for the helpline, volunteers have the added challenge of not only ensuring they get respite and can switch off from a role requiring extensive listening and consistent empathy, but also of not being able to, as easily, ‘leave it at the office’.  

“It takes a special sort of person to be a remote helpline volunteer.  

To be able to hold that space for someone who needs help, to truly listen and to simultaneously be thinking to what further support they need that you can signpost or refer to, well, that’s a lot! To do this from your spare bedroom, potentially after a shift at your day job, and to then go back to ‘relaxing at home’ afterwards - wow. We must not forget how precious, and potentially precarious, helpline volunteering and volunteers is and are.”- Sarah Hickie, VCSE Development Advisor at Voscur.  

To protect their volunteers from burning out, to ensure the benefits of volunteering from home outweigh the risks and that volunteers and callers are safeguarded, SARSAS make sure to support their volunteers adequately with wrap around support, supervision, briefings, debriefs and lots of kindness and care. No one is left to feel isolated or wrestling with their feelings alone after a challenging support call.  

If you are a volunteer coordinator who manages remote volunteers, and want to talk through how you can best support them our VCSE Development Advisors can offer advice, guidance and support. You can find out more about our support offer over at: How to get support | Voscur 

The impressive results the consistent and reliable efforts of SARSAS’s volunteers ensures that thousands of people in Bristol get to speak to someone when they need to – and that deserves a big thank you. 

SARSAS is one of the organisations involved in a health system programme called Pathfinder, which is managed by the Avon and Somerset Sexual Violence Alliance. The programme aims to transform the health and community services for adult victims and survivors of sexual assault and abuse and Voscur are privileged to be hosting the Partnerships Manager role. We’ll be sharing more on this programme as it develops. 

At the time of writing this article organisations such as Age UK, ERIC - The Children's Bowel & Bladder Charity, Womankind, WECIL, Young Carers Development Trust are all recruiting for remote befrienders and/or helpline volunteers – could this be a role that suits you? Take a look at their role descriptions over at Voscur and Can Do Bristol. 

To find out more about volunteering at SARSAS take a look at their volunteering web page.