26 August 2019
Definition
A Non-Legal Support Service - Ongoing is the provision of ongoing support by a Centre over a period of time to assist and support a person to resolve specific, nonlegal problems.
See Non-Legal Support Service - Discrete for full definition of Non-Legal Support including common roles.
Non-Legal Support Service - Ongoing or Discrete?
The difference between a Non-Legal Support Service - Ongoing and a Non-Legal Support Service - Discrete is that in an ongoing service, the Centre makes an upfront commitment to support the Service User through a particular process, whereas a discrete service is a one-off appointment for a particular session (eg one financial counselling appointment or one meeting with the Aboriginal access worker).
The National Data Standards Manual identified Non-Legal Support as one service type, with Discrete and Ongoing as subcategories. This Data Consistency Guide has separated them out (correctly) into the separate categories of Discrete and Ongoing - see our service groupings.
In CLASS, most reports currently bring together Discrete and Ongoing Non-Legal Support Services into one data item Non-Legal Support Service. Centres can create their own reports which show the split between Discrete and Ongoing Non—Legal Support Services.
How many Services?
Once an Ongoing Non-Legal Support Service has been opened, any future instances of the same type of non-legal support (eg help dealing with debts, support in relation to drug / alcohol addiction, support to an Aboriginal person to access the legal system, domestic violence support) do not get separately counted as individual instances of Discrete Non-Legal Support Services.
However, if there is a different type of Non-Legal Support being provided, this can be separately recorded wither as a Discrete Service or Ongoing Service as relevant.
Case studies and examples
Case Study - Fleur non-legal support
Case Study - FVPLS support to Mary
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