Leeds CIL's main service is ASIST (Actively Seeking Independence Support Team) which provides support for disabled and older people and the families of disabled children with all aspects of taking control of the services they need. This includes support to recruit, manage and pay one or more support workers, called Personal Assistants (PAs). The service is used by people in receipt of Direct Payments (DP), Personal Budgets (PB) and the Independent Living Fund (ILF) who choose to use some or all of their funding to employ a PA to deliver some or all of the personal care and support required to meet their assessed needs.

ASIST is currently working with over 700 customers and has played a major role in increasing the numbers of people in Leeds who choose 'Self-Directed Support' (SDS) as the way to meet their assessed personal care and daily living needs. Also, any of the approximately 2000 customers that ASIST has supported in the past five years can contact the service if they need support, for example if a customer needs to recruit another PA, or is having any difficulty managing a PA.

ASIST provides three types of support:
1. A brokerage service
2. Independent Living Advisers
3. Finance Support.

To find out more about these services please download the ASIST booklet. If you would like more information on that please contact us .