Direct payments are a way of giving more choice and control to disabled children and their families about the services they use. Parents can be given money to pay for and arrange services for their disabled child rather than accept those their local authority offers. You and your child arrange how, when and where support services best fit into your lives.The amount of money you will get should be the equivalent to the cost of that service, run by the Council. If there is no local authority service, you may have to negotiate how much that service would realistically cost to provide.

Direct Payments are worth thinking about if a young person has been assessed for a service but has been on the waiting list and getting no help for a long time. Direct Payments may also be right for you if you and your child don't have a say about how the services you use are run and you feel as if you are always fitting in with what they can offer, rather than what you really want.

But using direct payments does require you to keep accounts and records of how the money is spent. And if you don't buy into a service, you will find yourself taking responsibility for finding the best person to look after your child.

How do you get Direct Payments?

In Brighton and Hove, Direct Payments for Parents are managed by Disabled Children's Social Care Service. To get direct payments your child needs to have been assessed as needing a service. If your child isn't currently getting any services and you think they may be entitled to some, ring Seaside View on 01273 265825 to get a community care assessment. Ask for an assessment of your needs as a carer at the same time. Find out more about needs assessments.

If your child is assessed as needing a service, they cannot be refused Direct Payments if this is their choice. Local authorities have a duty to offer Direct Payments: the law says they MUST tell you about Direct Payments and support you if you wish to take these up. Locally, if you are already getting services, your child's social worker should have told you about this alternative to accepting services run by Brighton & Hove Children's Services.

Negotiating Direct Payments: what are the issues?

Direct Payments does mean extra work but the rewards can be very great. These are some of the issues that worry parents about arranging support for their child.

Asking for what you need

Talking about hours: how much is enough? It makes sense to make a detailed record of how many hours and what sort of help your child needs on a daily or weekly basis to do the sorts of things that other children their age who are not disabled would expect to be able to do. Be clear how much of this need you cannot meet and how much of a break you both need from each other. You may need to do this on a daily, weekly or monthly basis but plan it out for the whole year and remember about school holidays. This will give you an idea of the number of hours you need. All families have different needs: what other families get is irrelevant.

Talking about money: how much is enough? The amount of money you will get should be the equivalent to the cost of that service, run by the Council. If there is no local authority service, you may have to negotiate over how much that service would realistically cost to provide. Local authorities MUST make payments at a rate that covers the reasonable cost of buying in a service to meet your family's assessed needs. There should not be a standard rate that is offered to everyone on a 'take it or leave it' basis. You will have legal obligations as an employer and the amount you get must cover things like NI payments, holiday and sick pay as well as basic pay. Remember, you really need to negotiate on the basis of a 56-week year: anyone you employ has an entitlement to 4 weeks paid holiday and you will need someone else to cover while they are away, and they will need to be paid too!

Direct Payments: what feels scary?

Finding the best people to support your child: where do you look? Parents tell us that good places to advertise for free are http://www.gumtree.co.uk/ and on the website of the Sussex University Career Development and Employment Service. It is also worth asking staff who work with your child at school and St Johns School and College have a noticeboard where any local parent can advertise to their staff.

If you're looking for at home childcare, the Council’s At Home Childcare Service may be able to help. Coordinated by the Family Information Service (FIS), At Home Childcarers are registered with Offsted on the Voluntary Childcare Register, which means they’ve had an enhanced CRB police check, have a childcare qualification, paediatric first aid training and public liability insurance. They’re self-employed and some can offer an enhanced service for children with special needs. If you want to find out more, call Sian Bruce, the FIS At Home Childcare Coordinator on 01273 293545, or email her at familyinfo@brighton-hove.gov.uk

You can't meet everyone who replies to an ad but if you ask the right questions, you can tell a lot about a person from their application. It's worth remembering that parents and disabled children and young people have the legal right to disregard discrimination laws.

If writing a job description, advertising, interviewing and recruitment all feels a bit overwhelming, the Department of Health and the Department for Education and Skills have put together some very helpful guides to make the process less daunting both for parents and young people. We think 'A Parent's Guide to Direct Payments' is a very useful and accessible book and it's free. You can download a copy from the Department for Education's website or call them to request a copy on 0845 60 222 60. My Money, My Way is a young person's guide to Direct Payments and is free from SCOPE. Download it from Scope's website or call 080 8800 3333 for a copy.

Locally, Brighton and Hove Federation of Disabled People run a Direct Payments Service that supports parents of disabled children and disabled adults using DP. They can help with issues like finding or recruiting a PA, training for a PA, or tax and insurance. They can also give advice and support about being an employer, and payroll services. You can contact them on 01273 296747.

Paying people: our biggest worry is often about managing the responsibilities of being an employer but this doesn't need to be complicated. Using as little paper as possible is often best! Because you are not being paid and are just effectively receiving and handing out money you don't need to act as a business employer. Managing deductions for tax, National Insurance contributions, holiday and sick pay is easy and straightforward if you use the government's Simplified PAYE Deduction Scheme on-line. It does all the calculations for you month by month for everyone you employ, you can print off payslips and at the end of the tax year, at the click of a button it files your tax return! To find out how to get started visit http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/ or http://www.gateway.gov.uk/.

Keeping track of how you are spending the money doesn't need to be a burden. You will need to open a bank account just for Direct Payments and, of course, it's important you keep receipts and bank statements. The law says that local authorities must check that the money you are given is used for what has been agreed. So using Direct Payments does require you to keep accounts and records of how the money is spent. But you should not have to make weekly or even monthly returns if this doesn't make sense in your circumstances.