Warning use caution: Vulnerable families must exercise…
Vulnerable families must exercise extreme caution with this serviceMy experience with The YOU Trust has left me deeply concerned about how vulnerable and disabled domestic abuse survivors are treated when formal external proceedings are involved. As a parent representing a cognitively impaired individual, I attended a long intake meeting with senior IDVA staff Sophie Steele expecting a dedicated care and support service. The assessor openly acknowledged they lacked specialized legal qualifications, yet they still required my family member to relive years of historic DV/DA trauma.Despite the representative verbally recognising our clear vulnerabilities and communication difficulties, no independent review of our physical evidence took place. We repeatedly offered documentation, but it was completely and repeatedly refused stating if we pick you then we will look at your evidence. We initially led to believe and understood this service to be strictly for client support, but we later discovered the organisation compiles internal assessment reports and dangerous internal wording like “primary victim” without review evidence or checking if there is evidence it is then sent directly to external decision-makers without transparent consent.The organisation relies heavily on a rigid internal classification system to allocate help. In our case, this framework felt like a gatekeeping exercise that completely sidelined real evidence as it is purely based upon probabilities not fact, leaving an actual survivor isolated and even more vulnerable. Families are being offered what their led to believe is long-term support, only for the true scope to change into an assessment process conducted without expert, qualified reviews of the facts. I strongly caution anyone dealing with this service to seek independent advice before engaging. Ask exactly how your information will be shared and what specific qualifications the assessor holds. Because of personal short-term memory challenges, I always ensure meetings are transparently recorded for accuracy. If any service refuses to allow you to keep an accurate record of your own words, it may be best to disengage. Please protect yourself, review every document carefully before signing, and seek independent professional guidance first.