Further guidance on Intouch

Use of third parties as a contact point

As we’ve seen, not a requirement. Where they are used they must have had the appropriate Personal Enquiries (DBS etc). There’s no reason not to use a third party related to someone involved in the activity, but if you do you need to think about what you will do to ensure the system still works if an incident occurs involving the relation.

Holding records of participants

There is no specific form to fill in with all the details of those involved in an activity. Rather than duplicating data it should be easier to use your existing records for the activity, whether this is personal detail record cards, activity information forms, nights away information forms, a database or other system.

Weekly meetings

As mentioned, InTouch is required for weekly meetings. This doesn’t mean lots of extra work and a third party required every week, simply that you need to go through the process to make sure a system is in place that can then be used for all your meetings. It is likely that most or all things that this highlights you will be doing already, such as; parents knowing the phone number for the Scout headquarters or leaders, parents providing details including details of next of kin for all new members etc.

Mobile phones

Mobile phones can be a very useful tool as part of an InTouch system. However there are a number of issues that you need to take into account if you intend to rely on them:

• Will there be a signal where you are? What will you do if there is no signal?
• Is there any way of charging the phone? What will you do if it runs out of power?
• If you keep all the contact details on the phone and it runs out of power or is broken during an activity, how will you find those details?
• If the young people have mobile phones and contact their parents about anything happening during the event, how will you know what the parents have been told?
• It may be useful to have some sort of mobile phone agreement with the young people and their parents to include areas such as, when mobile phones will be acceptable, what they are not acceptable for, any communication to do with the event should also be informed to the leaders etc.

Large events

Likely to be a two level system. The organisers’ InTouch system will look at what contingents / groups are attending how they communicate with them, and the contingents’ / groups’ system will look who is a member of their party and how to communicate with their parents.

Emergency procedures

This remains a set procedure that is the same every time. There is an Emergency Procedure Prompt Card that can be kept on you that takes you through the procedure step by step.