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Receiving and spending your vouchers

Congratulations on being awarded a voucher as part of the BIG Assist programme! In order for you to be able to spend these vouchers, you must first accept the recommendations provided. Initial contact to suppliers is to be made through the Big Assist website, customers are then free to contact the suppliers of their choice to discuss the support they need further offline. Once a supplier has been selected and the work agreed both the supplier and customer do need to record the agreement on the Big Assist website Without details of this we will be unable to reimburse the suppliers cost of the support! In some cases customers are reviewing a number of suppliers before making a decision, using a variety of ways to short list and determine their choice of supplier. Customers are able to contact all the suppliers of their choice from the Marketplace to request additional information including a quote to help choose the supplier who will best meet their support needs. 1. The vouchers issued are for a fixed amount excluding VAT. All quotes you receive should also be exclusive of VAT. 2. The vouchers awarded to customers are time limited Customers must have chosen a supplier within 3 months of issue, and begun the programme of support within 6 months of issue. 3. Each voucher has to be allocated separately. If you decide to spend all your vouchers with one supplier, you would be required to allocate each voucher individually to that supplier. 4. Once the customer has selected the supplier, the customer and supplier will enter into an agreement for the delivery of the services. This is not an agreement with BIG Assist. 5. All processes will be done online through the BIG Assist website every supplier and customer will be able to keep a track of requests via their personal dashboards. 6. You are entering into an agreement with the supplier and they will be following their own policies around the delivery of work; you must ensure that these are agreeable. 7. Once the support has been delivered, you mark the project as complete within your dashboard online. You will also have the ability to rate the supplier online the rating that is given is public and will show on their profile. Customers who receive vouchers will follow these steps in order to spend them in the BIG Assist Marketplace.

Step by step process of spending your vouchers You must first accept the recommendations provided; log in to your dashboard and click on View recommendation.

This will take you to the Diagnostic recommendation page. You will then be able to see details of the topic areas you have been approved a voucher for, the amount of that voucher and you can to go to the Marketplace to search for suppliers who are able to offer the support you need. To accept the recommendations provided, just click on Approve these recommendations.

You can then find the topics you need support with and how much the vouchers are worth under the Vouchers tab.

By clicking on the Find Suppliers for this voucher button, you will be directed to the online Marketplace where you can use the search function to filter through our list of BIG Assist approved suppliers. You are free to spend each voucher or each part of it with different suppliers. Otherwise, if you decide to spend all your vouchers with one supplier, you are required to allocate each voucher individually to this supplier. Follow the same procedure for each voucher so they are all allocated to a project.

In the Marketplace you can filter your results by topic areas the reviewer has decided you need support for. The supplier must be approved from BIG Assist to provide support in your chosen topic area. Find out more details about each supplier by clicking on the Show details and then on the Full Profile button. Once you have chosen a supplier that suits the support your organisation needs, you can select the Get in touch option from the profile in order to contact them.

On your dashboard you can see all the organisations you have contacted and their status under Projects.

Once the supplier gets back to you with a project proposal, you can choose to either accept or dismiss it in the Projects tab. In order to accept it, you can click on Show offer, choose the voucher you want to use by clicking on the blank circle next to it and then click on Accept this project.

Choosing a voucher before accepting an offer will actually assign it to the project. Customer organisations can buy services on the Marketplace independently of a voucher use. If no voucher is ticked, the system will assume that you will pay for the project yourself and upon completion, the supplier will be requested to invoice you instead of BIG Assist. If you proceed, you will also be notified by the below box - click cancel and tick your voucher.

Once the service is provided, both sides have to agree that the project is complete. The supplier will first have to mark the project as complete on their dashboard and you will then be able to provide feedback and rate the support received by filling out the online feedback form. The feedback scoring is 5 for excellent, 1 for poor support. This option will be available only after the project date has passed. If you disagree that the project is complete, there is the option to report that by clicking on the relevant button. Please remember that we cannot process any payment until we receive your feedback. Providing your feedback is your formal confirmation that the project is complete.

The feedback and rating given is public and will show on the suppliers profile. The supplier will only receive the payment once all of the above is done.

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For any questions regarding the use of your voucher please do contact us Find out more on the BIG Assist website, by email, phone or follow us on twitter. Twitter: @BIGAssist Email: assist@ncvo-vol.org.uk Tel: 0207 520 2418 Website: www.bigassist.org.uk

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