Quality Assurance

The UK Volunteering Forum awards the Investing in Volunteers standard and oversees the quality assurance process.

Flow chart (PDF) explaining the quality assurance process.

1. Assessor recruitment, training and ongoing support

Assessors are chosen for their experience of assessment and their knowledge of volunteer management. They have all undergone a specific training course in IiV assessment.

All potential assessors will be recruited within an equal opportunities policy, with reference to a person specification and role description.

Regular assessor meetings are held to ensure good and consistent practice. These will include training, updates, sharing of good practice and resolution of questions/problems.

Assessors will be supported by a lead assessor. The lead assessor will monitor assessment processes by observing practice, giving feedback and offering one-to-one coaching.

2. Assessment decisions

After the agreed assessment activity is completed, the assessor can make one of three decisions.

  • Met – recommendation to UK Investing in Volunteers Quality Assurance Panel that the Standard be awarded for a period of 3 years
  • Not met – not awarded the standard, for reasons stated in the report
  • Met with conditions – specified conditions have to be fulfilled within a defined timescale. When fulfilled, the assessor will confirm the organisation has met the standard

If the organisation does not fulfil the conditions within a given period, they will be deemed to have not met the standard.

3. Appeals process

If an organisation feels that they have received an unfair decision, they may appeal.

  • In the first instance this is to the country manager or lead assessor
  • If it is not resolved, then a further appeal may be made to the UK Investing in Volunteers quality assurance panel. Its decision is final.

4. Customer service standards

Investing in Volunteers wants to deliver an excellent service. Please tell us what we are doing right or wrong, or suggest improvements to the service we offer. Contact us using the details on the Contact Us page.

We will aim to meet the following response times.

  • We will:
    • respond within five working days to e-mail enquiries
    • reply to all letters within five working days
  • Once you have registered for Investing in Volunteers, we will contact you to discuss pricing and timing arrangements, and assign you an approved assessor/advisor. Once you have submitted you self-assessment or undertaken your health check, you will receive written feedback within 15 working days.
  • You will receive oral feedback within three days following the assessment visit. This will tell you whether you meet the standard or whether specific conditions are required to be fulfilled.
  • You will receive a final report within ten working days of this assessment visit. If there are unavoidable delays to this timescale, you will be kept informed.

5. Our credentials

The UK Volunteering Forum awards the standard and monitors its quality.

The UK Volunteering Forum (UKVF) brings together the national volunteering development agencies of the four countries in the UK:

6. Monitoring and evaluation

The UKVF will evaluate Investing in Volunteers from time to time. The latest impact evaluation took place in 2006.