Get Connected: Investment Cycle 4 criteria

Expressions of interest for investment Cycle 4 are now closed

General eligibility

All investment bids will need to show how people who use services, family carers and/or staff will benefit from improved access to information and communication technology (ICT). The funding is for capital expenditure that will support adult social care providers and organisations to extend personalisation through enhanced access to ICT.

All bids must cover one or both of these objectives:

• improving access by people who use services, carers and staff to ICT to enhance the quality of life offered within the service and/or
• improving access by people who use services, carers or staff to ICT that will support their learning, training and development.

Further information about Get Connected is available in the FAQs.

Cycle 4: closed March 2011

Get Connected is intended to open up access to the benefits of the internet for staff and users of adult social care services in England. Expressions of Interest for Cycle 4 are now closed. 

As the requests for funding have been very high, it will be necessary to prioritise when selecting organisations to be invited to make a full application.

We will carefully screen each Expression of Interest in making the decision about which organisations to invite to make a full application. Please make sure that your Expression of Interest:

• is completely accurate. In this final cycle we will not be able to consider incomplete or inaccurate documentation or contact you to correct errors
• makes it clear the impact that your project will have on service users and the staff who provide your service. We will be considering how much difference your project will make to their experiences
• contains the details of the person who will be managing your project if we are able to provide funding. We want to be sure that you will be able to take your project forward effectively.

How and when to apply for Cycle 4

• Expressions of Interest for Cycle 4 will open on 31 January 2011
• Expressions of Interest for Cycle 4 will close at midnight on 25 March 2011

Who can apply?

Please be advised that the purpose of the Get Connected Investment project is to improve the experience of service users or staff training and NOT administration.

The fourth and final cycle of the Investment Project is for private and voluntary sector adult social care providers offering services in England and registered with the Care Quality Commission, Financial Services Authority, Charity Commission or Companies House.

Please note: We are sorry that we cannot accept Expressions of Interest from statutory organisations, hospitals or other health care services, hospices, nursing agencies, adult placement schemes, housing or homelessness organisations or sheltered housing schemes, dedicated training providers or dedicated ICT suppliers.

Individual organisations who have already received a grant from Get Connected will not be considered for further funding. Groups where two or more grants have been given will not be considered for further funding for another service.

Please see FAQs for more details.

Case studies/what type of bids will you accept?

For the final Cycle of funding, organisations will be able to apply within one of two categories.

Category 1

Social care organisations who wish to bid within the general eligibility criteria. There will be approximately £2 million to fund bids in this category.

Category 2

Category 2i: Social care organisations who wish to bid to support the ICT training of independent Personal Assistants within an area/ locality.

• Example of a Category 2i bidOpen

  The Niceplace organisation provides day activities for people with social care needs in its community. The organisation would like ICT equipment and better ICT connectivity so that it can offer training to personal assistants in the area who would like support for their on-line learning and updating.

  The Evergreen organisation already provides access to e-learning for its staff using some ICT equipment. They would like to include personal assistants in their offer as they recognise that it is important for everyone working in social care to be up to date with their learning and training. They could offer some training space to personal assistants and give them support with their ICT skills if they had some more equipment.

  Category 2ii: Eligible organisations who wish to bid to support grant recipients or other social care organisations to sustain their service user or staff skills in the use of ICT in support of personalisation.

• Example of a Category 2ii bidOpen

  The Grey Power project in Sunville has a track record of supporting older people in getting to grips with ICT and maintaining their interest in using their ICT skills. They would like to extend their offer to local social care organisations, recognising that it would be good if more people were able to get online with confidence. They would need some ICT equipment that they could take out to care settings to get people started to do this.

  The Skills for All project in Breezetown has been working with people with a learning disability to develop their use of ICT so that they can manage their own services online when they want to. Some of the people in the project have been helping to train others, and Skills for All would like to train some trainers so that more people can use ICT confidently. They would need some more ICT equipment to do this, and have some portable items that could be taken out to train on other sites.

There will be up to £1 million to fund bids in this category.

How much funding can I apply for?

The level of funding that you can apply for is dependent on the size of your organisation (see below).

• Micro or small organisationsOpen

  As a micro or small organisation (up to 49 full-time equivalent staff) or domiciliary care agency with 1–3 branches, you may submit a bid as follows:

  Up to a value of £20,000 per grant to improve access to ICT in order to enhance quality of life and/or skills.

  If your submitted bid under category 1 OR category 2 is accepted, then this is how we will respond subject to funding being available:

  • eligible items for up to £5,000 would be met in full.
  • eligible items for up to £15,000 would be met in full.
  • eligible items for up to £25,000 would be met up to a value of £20,000.

  If you are bidding in Category 2 then you may include in your bid up to an additional £5000 to extend training opportunities described in your bid to external organisations or individual personal assistants. This must be in support of ICT skills, or for training ICT trainers.

• Medium-sized organisationsOpen

  As a medium-sized organisation (50 to 249 full-time equivalent staff) or domiciliary care agency with 4–20 branches, your bid under Category 1 will be subject to you identifying matched funding, and you may submit a bid as follows:

  Up to a value of £20,000 per grant to improve access to ICT in order to enhance quality of life and/or skills. This is subject to matched funding being identified by the organisation making the bid.

  If your submitted bid under Category 1 is accepted  then this is how we will respond subject to funding being available:

  • eligible items for up to £5,000 would be met up to a value of £2,500.
  • eligible items for up to £15,000 would be met up to a value of £7,500.
  • eligible items for up to £25,000 would be met up to a value of £12,500.

  If your submitted bid under Category 2 is accepted  then matched funding will not be required and this is how we will respond subject to funding being available:

  • eligible items for up to £5,000 would be met in full.
  • eligible items for up to £15,000 would be met in full.
  • eligible items for up to £25,000 would be met up to a value of £20,000.

  If you are bidding in Category 2 then you may include in your bid up to an additional £5000 to extend training opportunities described in your bid to external organisations or individual personal assistants. This must be in support of ICT skills, or for training ICT trainers.

• Large organisationsOpen

  As a large organisation you may only bid in Category 2 and will not have to indentify matched funding. You may submit a bid as follows:

  Up to a value of £20,000 per grant to improve access to ICT in order to enhance quality of life and/or skills as well as either:

  - Supporting ICT training of independent Personal Assistants within an area/ locality, or

  - Supporting grant recipients or other social care organisations to sustain their service user or staff skills in the use of ICT in support of personalisation.

  If your submitted bid is accepted, then this is how we will respond subject to funding being available:

  • eligible items for up to £5,000 would be met in full.
  • eligible items for up to £15,000 would be met in full.
  • eligible items for up to £25,000 would be met up to a value of £20,000.

  You may include in your bid up to an additional £5000 to extend training opportunities described in your bid to external organisations or individual personal assistants. This must be in support of ICT skills, or for training ICT trainers.

Any of the following elements included in your Application will NOT be accepted as eligible:

• Organisational, management or administrative equipment or software.
• Assistive technology (“any product or service designed to enable independence for disabled or older people" DH 2008). Other funding has previously been made available for assistive technologies.
• Development of websites or promotional material.

(back to top)

Bookmark and share

What are these? DEJI