Advice and Information Volunteer

Inspiring, supportive, and committed - just a few of the words we’d use to describe our volunteers.

At Rethink Mental Illness, volunteers are at the heart of what we do. They play a vital role in supporting our services and making a real difference in people’s lives. If you’re looking for a rewarding role where you can have a positive impact while developing your own skills and experience, we’d love you to join us.

About the role

We are seeking volunteers from diverse backgrounds to support our Advice and Information Service. With your support, we will be able to make a difference to more people who are affected by mental illness.

What do we do

We give practical advice and information to our clients. Our team receives phone calls, web chats, and letters from people with mental illness, their families, employers, and professionals.

What you will do

We want you to be able to provide simple advice or information to our clients via webchat.

Common topics that our service advises on are:

• Mental health conditions and symptoms
• Living with mental illness
• Discrimination
• Police, courts and prison
• Mental health laws
• Rights and restrictions
• Support for carers

You will use a computer to chat with clients and record information.

Who are we looking for

We are looking for people 18 or over who are committed, reliable, honest, and able to communicate well with people from different backgrounds.

Maybe you:

• Have lived experience of mental illness?
• Care for someone with a mental illness?
• Are gaining experience for employment?
• Are a retired health professional?
• Want to make a difference to the lives of people with mental illness?

You must be able to use a computer. We need people who can use:

• the internet,
• Microsoft word
• Microsoft outlook
• Microsoft teams

You must also own a computer and have access to the internet. Unfortunately, we can’t provide these.

What you can gain from volunteering

Volunteering with our team is a great way to:

• Connect with other volunteers and staff
• Empower clients to take action with whatever issue they face
• Gain knowledge of the mental health system, mental health laws and mental health conditions
• Learn transferrable skills such as research skills and managing clients
• Progress your career. Many of our volunteers have successfully secured employment within our charity, the wider field of mental health or related roles after being involved with our service

We will do our best to support you in any way that we can. This will of course depend on what you want to achieve from volunteering.

How we choose our volunteers

We will look at what you write on your application form.

We will invite suitable applicants for an informal interview, which will take place online. Following the interview, you will complete a few quick computer-based tasks.

When will the informal interview take place

We will be looking to meet you online at the beginning of October 2025.

Training we will provide

You will be given self-directed training with remote support from our friendly team on the following areas:

• Research skills
• Managing clients via webchat
• Providing advice
• Dealing with clients at risk of harm
• How to use our systems

The above training will take you about 10 hours to complete in total.

You will also need to complete a few short e-learning courses as part of your training with us. E-learning courses take between 30 mins – 1 hour to complete.

You will also have access to our service-specific training on topics such as:

• The Mental Health Act/ Mental Capacity Act
• The Care Act
• The Equality Act
• The Mental Health System

Time commitments

At present, our webchat facility is open between 9:30am – 4:00pm Monday to Friday.

Each shift generally runs from 9:00am – 12:30 (morning shift) and 12:30 – 4:00pm (afternoon shift). This allows time to get settled before a shift and tie up any lose ends at the end of a shift.

We would like a commitment from you of at least 1 shift per week.

There may be periods where we ask you to support our team outside of these times to allow for meetings or training sessions.

We also would like a minimum commitment of 9-months. This is to ensure you get the most out of the knowledge and skills gained during training.

Start date

We are looking to recruit volunteers to begin training at the end of October with the intention of starting to work with clients in November 2025.

You won’t be able to start with our service until we have received a satisfactory basic DBS check and verified that you are allowed to volunteer in the UK.

Closing date

The closing date is Sunday 5th October 2025. We may close the vacancy early if we receive a high number of applications.

Volunteer expenses

No, there shouldn’t be any costs to volunteer with us.

Expected to travel

Travel will be very rare, if at all.

Where you'll be based

You will be based at home. This means we can accept applications from all over England.

If you would like more information please contact:

Nic Henderson – Volunteer and Community Engagement Lead

E-mail: nic.henderson@rethink.org

Who are we? 

We’re Rethink Mental Illness, a leading charity provider of mental health services in England. We support thousands of people through our groups, services, policy, campaigns and advice and information. Our work supports us in delivering on our mission: “A better life for everyone severely affected by mental illness.”     

It is an exciting time to join our growing charity. We are on a transformation journey, one that supports the delivery of the organisation strategy – delivering Communities that Care. Supporting employees, managers and leaders through this change is a key priority for the People function. Just like its key that we attract diverse people to come and work for us.     

Diversity, Equity, Inclusion   

Diversity is important to us and we appreciate difference through difference, inclusiveness and belonging. It gives us a deeper understanding of the world, our society and the diverse communities we’re working with. By including everyone, we are able to draw on the unique experiences and expertise of our people to help shape and enrich our workplace and improve our services. One way we are doing is through our valued staff networks which play a critical and highly valued role in keeping us focused on creating a diverse, inclusive and engaged employer.  We recognise and support staff networks for our Black, Asian and minority ethnic and our LGBTQIA+ colleagues. We are also proud to have been awarded Disability Confident Employer status and are a signatory to the Business in the Community Race at Work Charter.   

Becoming a truly anti-racist organisation   

We have an ambition of become a truly anti-racist employer, campaigning organisation and service provider - and in our efforts to influence policy and wider societal factors impacting on mental health set out in our anti-racist statement . We have designed a multi-year anti-racist programme of work contained in our Race Equality Action Plan which demonstrate our intention to hold ourselves accountable and be judged on our progress on becoming a truly anti-racist organisation.   

We therefore actively encourage and welcome applications from everyone, including applicants with lived experience, those who are Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer (or questioning), Intersex and (asexual) (LGBTQIA+), people with a disability, and people from Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic (BAME) backgrounds.