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3C — Six-Week Foundation Pathway

3C — Six-Week Foundation Pathway

The structured first six weeks of active Restitute support.

3CJuly 2026

3C

About this section

  1. 3C sets out the Six-Week Foundation Pathway.
  2. It covers the first structured period of active support after the first appointment has taken place.
  3. The Six-Week Foundation Pathway is a firm structure designed to stop early support drifting into reactive, open-ended contact without a clear focus.
  4. The purpose of the first six weeks is to help the client move from overwhelm into a more organised, emotionally supported and practically supported position.
  5. During this period, the worker should help the client identify urgent pressures, important longer-term issues, key professional contacts, practical tasks, family pressures, risk, routines, contact boundaries and early changes that may improve day-to-day stability.
  6. The work should stay active and focused, without drifting into unfocused contact or task completion without relationship.
  7. This section covers the first structured six-week period of active support, including weekly support, worker stance, practical tools, family and household impact, practical support, social isolation, forms, professional liaison, engagement, assessment and review, therapy discussion, supervision, risk, safeguarding and Lamplight recording.
  8. This section should be read alongside the Client Pathway Standards, Restitute’s Grant-making Policy, safeguarding and digital safeguarding requirements, local emergency/crisis routes and Lamplight recording requirements.

3C.1 Section-specific standards

  1. The Client Pathway Standards apply to this section. The standards below are additional requirements specific to the Six-Week Foundation Pathway.
  2. The Six-Week Foundation Pathway is based on active support, not simple calendar time.
  3. The pathway usually involves weekly appointments during the first six weeks, wherever possible.
  4. Example wording and templates for foundation appointment confirmations or reminders are held in Appendix C.
  5. Exceptions are allowed, but they must not become informal drift. Where the six-week structure cannot be followed because of missed appointments, client need, safeguarding, crisis, access needs, worker absence or another clear reason, the exception must be recorded and discussed in supervision where it affects the integrity of the pathway.
  6. At the sixth appointment, or around the sixth week of active support where the appointment pattern has shifted, the worker should review progress with the client.
  7. The review must consider whether the client is ready to move to fortnightly support and whether engagement, risk, safeguarding, crisis contact or boundary issues affect that decision.
  8. The reason for the six-week review decision must be recorded in Lamplight.
  9. Supervisor input should be used where there has been repeated non-engagement, high levels of contact outside appointments, extension of weekly support, possible closure, therapy discussion, or safeguarding/risk/vulnerability concerns.

3C.2 Worker stance during the Six-Week Foundation Pathway

  1. During the Six-Week Foundation Pathway, the worker should be warm, emotionally supportive, practical and proactive.
  2. The worker is not there only to listen, but they are also not there to take over.
  3. The worker should help the client think, organise, prioritise, act and notice their own progress.
  4. The worker should feel like a calm, wise, practical person beside the client: someone who understands how systems work, can help make sense of what is happening, can find a route through, and can help the client work out what needs sorting next.
  5. Advice, ideas and tasks should be offered as choices and discussed with the client, not imposed.
  6. The worker should not present themselves as a legal, medical, financial, safeguarding or clinical expert unless they hold that role. Where specialist advice is needed, the worker should help the client reach the right person or service.

3C.3 Understanding client need and preparing to respond

  1. Clients entering the Six-Week Foundation Pathway may be dealing with several overlapping issues at once.
  2. These may include criminal justice processes, safeguarding, social care, education, family conflict, family court, housing, benefits, debt, employment, health, mental health, domestic abuse, coercive control, online harm, community pressure, cultural shame, disability, neurodivergence, language barriers or the impact of trauma across the family.
  3. Support workers should expect complexity, but must not assume that every client needs the same response.
  4. Where a client’s circumstances involve an unfamiliar process, culture, community context, disability, health issue, legal process, safeguarding route, education process or practical barrier, the worker should seek information, guidance or supervision before acting.
  5. Workers should expect to do some of the legwork in the early sessions. This may include researching services, processes, options, forms, routes, practical solutions or ideas that may help the client.
  6. The worker should bring information back to the client as possible choices, not as instructions.

3C.4 Client tasks and supported action

  1. Some clients need clear, manageable tasks between sessions.
  2. Tasks should be agreed with the client, specific, realistic and linked to what the client says they need.
  3. Examples include making a GP appointment, finding a school contact, checking a letter or deadline, writing down questions for a professional, locating a document, trying one small routine or organising step, checking whether a form has arrived, sending a consent message, making a list of what feels urgent, or noting what happens during the week.
  4. The worker should review agreed tasks at the next session or through agreed contact.
  5. When the client completes a task, the worker should notice it and respond with clear, genuine praise.
  6. If a client repeatedly cannot complete agreed tasks, the worker should think about why. The task may be too large, the client may be overwhelmed, there may be a practical barrier, or a different approach may be needed.

3C.5 Practical tools, routines, control and choice

  1. Practical tools help reduce pressure by moving tasks, worries and commitments out of the client’s head and into a visible structure.
  2. Structure and routine can help people living with trauma or the impact of abuse feel safer, more grounded and more in control.
  3. Practical tools should increase control and choice, not monitor, judge or criticise the client.
  4. The client and family may use diaries, notebooks, task lists, urgent/important lists, meal planners, shopping lists, weekly planners, whiteboards, fridge planners, visible household planners, children’s routine charts, appointment diaries, sleep notes or what-actually-happened-this-week diaries. These are client-facing organising tools. They do not replace Lamplight.
  5. The worker should not impose one model of family life, parenting, food, sleep, organisation or household routine. The tool should fit the client, not the other way round.
  6. Where a tool does not work for the client, the worker should adapt it or drop it.

3C.6 Family impact and wider household needs

  1. During the Six-Week Foundation Pathway, the worker should begin to understand how what has happened is affecting the wider family or household.
  2. This should not become intrusive or unfocused. The purpose is to understand what the client is carrying and where the family may need practical, emotional or system support.
  3. The worker may need to consider the survivor, siblings, partners, grandparents, other children in the household, school attendance or behaviour, family conflict, children missing out on activities, caring responsibilities, holidays and school breaks, transport, financial pressure, safety, safeguarding, health and mental health pressures. Support remains through the lead carer, but it should help make sure other children in the household are not forgotten.
  4. Any action involving another professional or family member must follow consent and safeguarding requirements.

3C.7 Early practical support and thoughtful help

  1. During the first six weeks, the support worker should actively consider whether practical support or thoughtful help would improve family functioning, safety, stability, engagement with recovery or wellbeing.
  2. This does not have to be a response to financial hardship.
  3. Early practical support and thoughtful help must follow Restitute’s Grant-making Policy.
  4. Support is not an entitlement and must be assessed case by case. It should be proportionate, justified, recorded and linked to what the worker has learned about the client.
  5. The support should improve family functioning, safety, stability, engagement with recovery or wellbeing. It should not feel generic, excessive, intrusive or like a reward for distress.
  6. Examples may include a book, flowers, a haircut, petrol or essential travel costs, cleaning, garden help, skip hire, a structured wellbeing activity, an activity for the client or family, a household item, help with a practical barrier, or a contribution to something that would make life easier.
  7. Where practical support, an item, a service or a thoughtful piece of help is agreed, the worker should not purchase or arrange it alone.
  8. The worker should ask the purchasing or practical support administration function, or another agreed function, to source the item, arrange delivery, contact the provider or complete the purchase.
  9. This ensures that at least two people are involved in any material transaction.
  10. The action, approval route, cost where relevant, reason and intended outcome must be recorded in Lamplight.
  11. Example wording and templates for practical support or thoughtful help communication are held in Appendix C.

3C.8 Social isolation, confidence and ordinary-life rebuilding

  1. During the foundation period, the worker should notice whether the client has become isolated.
  2. Isolation may show as rarely leaving the house, loss of friendships, avoiding groups, stopping usual activities, fear of judgement, loss of confidence or lack of safe opportunities to be with others.
  3. Social isolation should be treated as a support need, not as difficult behaviour.
  4. Some clients may have had very little consistent support, may not be used to being valued, and may be lonely, isolated or living with long-term hardship.
  5. The worker should consider practical help to rebuild ordinary life where this would be safe, wanted by the client and likely to reduce isolation. This may include helping the client identify safe opportunities for connection, hobbies, volunteering, work, community activity, friendships or other structured routines that fit their circumstances.
  6. The worker should not push social activity where it would be unsafe, overwhelming, culturally inappropriate or not wanted by the client.
  7. The worker should look for opportunities to help the client notice effort and progress, including tiny steps as well as major achievements.
  8. Where helpful, the worker may use tools that help the client notice what has gone well, such as a diary or sticker-based prompt. The tool should be dropped or adapted if it does not fit the client.

3C.9 Finances, benefits and practical systems

  1. During the Six-Week Foundation Pathway, the worker should notice whether finances, benefits, debt, housing, employment, disability-related costs or caring pressures are creating avoidable stress.
  2. The worker should approach spending, debt or budgeting without judgement.
  3. Where DLA, PIP, Universal Credit or other benefit or financial-support issues may be relevant, the worker should identify this early.
  4. Completing relevant forms with or on behalf of clients is a vital part of the support worker role.
  5. Workers must receive appropriate training during induction before completing benefit, financial-support or other complex forms on behalf of clients.
  6. Workers may help clients complete forms, gather evidence, prepare benefit journal entries, contact benefit services or follow up applications where this is within their training and agreed role.
  7. Where the worker is unsure, the form is unusually complex, or there is a risk of inaccurate advice, the worker should discuss the next step in supervision before proceeding.
  8. Consent must be obtained before contacting DWP, local authority benefit services or another agency on the client’s behalf.
  9. Benefit/form support, consent, actions taken and outcomes must be recorded in Lamplight.

3C.10 Healthy behaviours and daily functioning

  1. The worker may need to notice whether stress, trauma, overwhelm or caring pressure is affecting daily functioning.
  2. This may include sleep, eating, drinking, smoking, substance use, caffeine, medication, exercise, housework, appointments or leaving the house.
  3. This should not become lifestyle policing.
  4. The purpose is to understand whether daily life has become harder to manage and whether small changes or another support route may help.
  5. Where relevant, the worker may ask the client to monitor a specific pattern over a short period, but only where this is useful and proportionate and does not make the client feel scrutinised, ashamed or overloaded.
  1. During the foundation period, the worker may need to help the client communicate with professionals or understand professional systems.
  2. The purpose is to reduce confusion, improve communication and help the client participate more confidently.
  3. The worker must obtain consent before contacting professionals on the client’s behalf unless safeguarding, serious harm, crime prevention, coercion, court order, statutory duty or overriding public interest requires information sharing without consent.
  4. Consent may be recorded through email, WhatsApp or another agreed route. Consent and any contact made must be recorded in Lamplight.
  5. Where the client is involved with children’s social care, family support, a CIN plan, a CP plan or another child protection process, the worker should consider whether the client wants Restitute to be included in meetings or communication.

3C.12 Client non-engagement, crisis contact and appointment boundaries

  1. If a client misses an appointment or does not respond during active support within the first six weeks, the worker should make one follow-up contact attempt within 5 working days and record the contact and outcome in Lamplight.
  2. The worker must not make repeated uncontrolled contact attempts.
  3. If there are repeated missed appointments, limited contact or no meaningful engagement, the worker must discuss the case in supervision before closure, extension or a revised engagement plan.
  4. Example wording and templates for missed appointment follow-up, revised engagement plans and non-engagement closure during active support are held in Appendix C.
  5. Planned appointments are where most support work takes place. Contact outside appointments should not usually become another support session.
  6. The client should know the worker’s working hours, based on the agreed safe contact route, and emergency or crisis routes, including 111 option 2, police/999, safeguarding routes or any locally agreed urgent support route.
  7. Workers should encourage clients to write down non-urgent issues so they can be discussed at the next appointment.
  8. If a client makes frequent contact outside appointments, repeatedly presents issues as urgent, or struggles to hold appointment boundaries, the worker should discuss this in supervision.
  9. High levels of contact outside appointments should not be treated as nuisance behaviour. The worker should consider whether the pattern reflects risk, distress, trauma response, loneliness, isolation, practical confusion, unclear boundaries, dependency or a need for a revised communication plan.
  10. Workers should respond warmly and consistently while keeping clear boundaries. Out-of-appointment contact must not replace planned support.
  11. Significant contact outside appointments, crisis contact, safeguarding concerns and agreed boundary plans must be recorded in Lamplight.

3C.13 Six-week assessment and review

  1. At the sixth appointment, or around the sixth week of active support where the appointment pattern has shifted, the support worker should check Lamplight for the scheduled six-week wellbeing, carer confidence and health assessments.
  2. The worker should remind the client that the assessment will be sent and encourage them to complete it.
  3. If the assessment has not been completed, the worker should complete it with the client at the next appointment.
  4. Workers must not prioritise assessment completion over safe and effective client support. Where the six-week assessment is delayed, the reason must be recorded in Lamplight.
  5. Example wording and templates for six-week assessment reminders and six-week review follow-up are held in Appendix C.
  6. The review should consider what has changed since support started, what the client has achieved, what is still urgent, what remains important but less urgent, whether risk or safeguarding concerns have changed, whether the client is engaging with support, whether contact outside appointments or boundary issues need review, whether weekly support is still needed, whether the client is ready to move to fortnightly support, whether therapy should be discussed, and whether early practical support or thoughtful help has been considered.
  7. Improvement should be noticed and shared with the client where this is helpful. Where visual tools such as charts are available, they may be used to help the client see progress.
  8. A lack of improvement or worsening scores should not automatically be treated as failure. Some clients may have understated their difficulties at baseline and become more honest as trust develops.
  9. The permitted outcomes at the six-week review are: move to fortnightly support; continue weekly support for a further defined period; extend the foundation period because there has not yet been enough active support; agree a revised engagement plan; close as non-engagement where the client is not participating and the non-engagement process has been followed; keep open for a defined review period because safeguarding, risk or vulnerability concerns need further review; seek safeguarding advice or make a safeguarding referral where the threshold is met; or contact another professional where this is needed for a CIN/CP plan, safeguarding, risk or other agreed professional involvement and consent or lawful information-sharing grounds are in place.
  10. Example wording and templates for moving to fortnightly support, continuing weekly support for a defined period, foundation-period extension and revised engagement plans are held in Appendix C.
  11. The reason for the decision must be recorded in Lamplight.

3C.14 Therapy discussion at six weeks

  1. Therapy is not a front-door or automatic offer.
  2. Discussion about therapy should usually take place at or after the six-week assessment and review, where the client wants to explore therapy or the worker thinks it may be helpful to offer information about the therapy referral route.
  3. Therapy must not be offered simply because the client is distressed.
  4. Therapy must not be used as a way of moving on clients who are high-contact, boundary-testing or difficult to hold within support. Boundary, engagement and crisis-contact patterns should be discussed in supervision.
  5. Urgent exceptions before the six-week review must be discussed in supervision before any referral route is explored.
  6. Where therapy is discussed, the support worker must explain that Restitute can support access to an agreed independent therapeutic referral route, but that clinical assessment, suitability, therapeutic approach and treatment planning sit with the qualified therapeutic provider.
  7. Restitute support workers and Delivery Sites do not assess clinical suitability for therapy, choose therapeutic modality, determine treatment need or hold clinical governance for therapeutic provision.
  8. Where the client wants to explore therapy, the support worker must follow the independent therapeutic referral route arrangements set out in 2D.3 and the Delivery Site’s agreed therapy referral route.
  9. Therapy must not be promised before client consent, referral route, approval, funding, availability and independent therapeutic assessment have been confirmed.
  10. Where a therapy referral is progressed, support-worker involvement must be reviewed through supervision, including whether Restitute support should pause, continue or be reviewed while therapy takes place. Restitute support may continue where it has a clear practical, family, agency, safeguarding, court or stabilisation focus, and must not duplicate therapy or drift into therapeutic work.
  11. Any referral form or checklist used must support coordination only. It must not be used to score or determine clinical need, suitability or therapeutic modality.
  12. Any therapy discussion or referral must be recorded in Lamplight, including the client’s view, relevant assessment or support context, worker and supervision views where used, consent, decision, referral route and next action.

3C.15 Supervision during the foundation period

  1. Supervision should help the worker think, hold boundaries, manage risk, avoid drift and feel supported.
  2. During the Six-Week Foundation Pathway, the worker should bring repeated missed appointments, limited engagement, high contact outside appointments, uncertainty about readiness for support, extension of weekly support, safeguarding concerns, changed risk, therapy discussion or referral, professional conflict, boundary concerns, worker uncertainty, worker emotional impact and high practical support needs to supervision.
  3. The worker should also use supervision where there is any concern that the work is drifting outside the model.
  4. Any agreed client action from supervision must be recorded in Lamplight where it affects the client pathway or support plan.

3C.16 Risk and safeguarding during the foundation period

  1. Risk assessment is not completed once and then left. The worker must update the Lamplight risk assessment where risk changes during the foundation period.
  2. Risk may change because of new information, family conflict, safeguarding concerns, criminal justice developments, court dates, housing issues, mental health, substance use, self-harm, attempts to complete suicide, threats, professional decisions or changes in the survivor’s circumstances.
  3. Where risk or safeguarding concerns change during the foundation period, the worker must follow the agreed safeguarding or escalation route, discuss the issue in supervision where required, record the decision and update the Lamplight risk assessment.

3C.17 Record keeping and Lamplight requirements

  1. Records during the foundation period should include appointment date and method, key issues raised by the client, urgent and important tasks, agreed client tasks, worker actions, professional contacts and consent, risk changes, safeguarding concerns, contact outside appointments, crisis contact, boundary plans, practical support or thoughtful help considered or offered, progress, achievements and successes, thinking time where it has been used, supervision decisions that affect the client pathway, assessment reminders and completion, and the six-week review decision.
  2. Achievements and successes should be recorded. These may include small steps as well as major outcomes.

3C.18 Appendix references

  1. Example wording and templates for common 3C communications are held in Appendix C.
  2. 3C should be read alongside the Client Pathway Standards, including the standards on Lamplight, case transfer and handover, lead-carer/child-centred practice, the Client Pathway Standards and Practice Audit and Spot-Check Pack, Restitute’s Grant-making Policy, safeguarding and digital safeguarding requirements, and the relevant local safeguarding and crisis routes.

3C.19 What must stay the same and what can change locally

  1. The Restitute Model needs to be delivered consistently, even when it is used in different places.
  2. Local Delivery Sites may adapt local arrangements where this does not change the model.
  3. Local changes must not remove key safeguards, weaken recording requirements, bypass safeguarding, remove supervision, or allow support to become unstructured.
Component Fixed requirement Can vary locally Not acceptable
Six-week structure First six weeks are a firm foundation structure based on active support. Exact appointment times and local scheduling. Allowing early support to drift into unstructured contact.
Active support timing Six-week review happens at the sixth appointment / around the sixth week of active support, not simple calendar time. How missed weeks are counted, with supervision. Treating six calendar weeks as sufficient where support barely happened.
Weekly rhythm Weekly appointments should usually happen during the foundation period. Alternative rhythm where client need or access requires it. Moving immediately to loose or ad hoc contact without reason.
Worker stance Worker is emotionally supportive, warm, practical and proactive. Individual style and wording. Only listening with no practical action, or taking over client decisions.
Worker legwork Worker researches options and brings choices back to the client. Sources and local routes used. Leaving the client to do all legwork while overwhelmed.
Client tasks Tasks are agreed, manageable and reviewed. Type and size of task. Vague homework with no purpose or follow-up.
Praise and confidence Worker notices effort and uses genuine praise. Wording and timing. Ignoring progress or using false reassurance.
Practical tools Client-facing diary, notebook, task list or equivalent visible tools should be used when they help the client or family hold dates, worries, tasks or routines outside their head. Lamplight remains the controlled worker record. Whiteboard, planner, app, paper diary or other tool. Forcing a tool that does not fit the client, or treating a client-facing tool as the worker’s controlled record.
Routines and structure Worker helps client look at daily routines and pressure points. Which routines are explored. Imposing one model of family life or organisation.
Social isolation and connection Worker treats isolation as a support need and helps rebuild ordinary life where this would be safe, wanted by the client and likely to reduce isolation. Local opportunities, hobbies, volunteering, work and community options. Treating isolation or high contact as nuisance behaviour.
Boundaries and high-contact patterns Repeated crisis contact or high levels of contact outside appointments require supervision and a communication/boundary plan where supervision identifies that one is required. Review period length and local supervision route. Allowing out-of-appointment contact to replace planned support.
Early practical support / thoughtful help Worker should actively consider whether practical support or thoughtful help would improve family functioning, safety, stability, engagement with recovery or wellbeing. Grant-making Policy must be followed. Support type, budget route and local approval process. Treating support only as poverty relief or sending generic items/support without thought.
Purchasing / material transactions Items, services and practical support must follow the agreed purchasing or practical support administration route so that at least two people are involved in material transactions. Local purchasing route and supplier process. Worker independently purchasing or arranging material support without the agreed control route.
Benefits and forms Workers identify benefit/form issues early and may complete relevant forms with or on behalf of clients where trained and supervised. Local training, supervision and internal process. Leaving clients to complete complex relevant forms alone, or workers acting outside training/supervision.
Assessment completion Worker checks Lamplight, prompts completion, completes the assessment with the client at the next appointment if it has not been completed, and records the reason where the assessment is delayed. Exact reminder wording. Letting six-week assessment drift indefinitely without reason or record.
Therapy discussion and independent therapeutic referral route Therapy is not a front-door or automatic offer. It is usually discussed at or after the six-week assessment and review where the client wants to explore therapy, or where the worker thinks it may be helpful to offer information about the therapy referral route. Restitute may support access to an agreed independent therapeutic referral route, but clinical assessment, suitability, therapeutic approach and treatment planning sit with the qualified therapeutic provider. Local therapeutic provider route, approval process, funding route, availability-check process and use of an agreed referral coordination record. Therapy as a front-door, automatic, distress-only or hard-work-client offer. Restitute workers or Delivery Sites deciding clinical suitability, choosing therapeutic modality, determining treatment need or promising therapy before consent, referral route, approval, funding, availability and independent therapeutic assessment have been confirmed.
Client non-engagement Repeated missed appointments require supervision and a permitted decision. Review period length, with supervision. Repeated missed appointments with no review or uncontrolled chasing.
Safeguarding Safeguarding concerns arising during the foundation period must pause the normal pathway where the concern makes normal pathway movement unsafe or requires escalation, and must be handled through the agreed safeguarding route. Local safeguarding thresholds and routes. Using the Restitute Model instead of local safeguarding procedures, or continuing normal pathway movement where safeguarding makes that unsafe.
Record keeping Key pathway information must be recorded in Lamplight. Use of a local pathway tracker for operational oversight, provided Lamplight remains the controlled client record. Key information held only in messages, paper notes or memory.

3C.20 Audit and spot-check resource

  1. The 3C audit and spot-check checklist is held in the Client Pathway Standards and Practice Audit and Spot-Check Pack.
  2. The checklist may be used for supervision, Lamplight record review, pilot-site review, quality assurance or learning after a concern, complaint, safeguarding issue or pathway breakdown.
  3. It is not completed for every client. Lamplight remains the controlled client record.
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