Customer Service Advisor - Inclusion Advice Line

Taunton, England, United Kingdom

6/18/2025

Some key information

•  The role is within the customer service team specialising in the Inclusion Advice Line
•  The Inclusion Advice Line is open 9am-5pm Monday to Friday so you will work those hours.
•  Based at County Hall, Taunton
•  Annual leave 25 days plus bank holidays - increasing to 28 days annual leave with more than 5 years continuous service.
•  Although we support a hybrid working model where a balance of both home and office working (an average of 2 days a week once trained) are welcomed as long as you have an area at home that you can work in dealing with confidential calls. Equally, if you prefer to be in the office that too is welcomed.
  
  

What will I be doing?

We are looking for a Customer Service Specialist to join our Inclusion Advice Line based in the Education Leadership Team here at Somerset Council.

The Inclusion Advice Line (IAL) provides an advice and support function for education setting professionals from Early Years through to Post 16. The IAL has been incredibly successful in providing early preventative advice and guidance to queries and concerns around SEND in general, but also around identifying and meeting the needs of all children and young people with SEND and other vulnerabilities, including those at risk of exclusion or struggling to attend school. The IAL is a relatively small team, but this is an exciting opportunity to develop the service to allow for greater resilience and faster response times.

We’re working to improve the lives of children and young people and their families here in Somerset and you’ll be a key part of that.

Day-to-day work will involve:

• communicating with internal education professionals, setting professionals and parents/carers via telephone, email and MS form submissions.
• providing real-time advice to the public to answer questions and guiding them towards the correct avenue of support, escalating concerns where needed.
• liaising with other organisations to problem solve queries.
• advising and supporting parent carers about the Education Health Care Plan (EHCP) process
  
  

What kind of experience or qualifications do I need?

We offer ongoing support, training and guidance to help you be the best you can be. But it will really help if you:

We offer ongoing support, training and guidance to help you be the best you can be, but it will really help if you have:

• experience of working with children and young people and an understanding of educational settings and SEND
• knowledge and understanding of the SEND Code of Practice 0-25 and statutory requirements and process
• knowledge of the Somerset Graduated Response Tool and early intervention
• strong communication skills, demonstrating empathy, curiosity, and solution-focussed practice
• a good level of IT competence and confidence
  
  

We’re proud to be here for the people of Somerset. And that means everyone in Somerset. An important part of this is ensuring that we are as diverse and inclusive as the people and communities we serve.

We welcome applications from a diverse range of backgrounds and experiences to enrich our team. You can always contact the hiring manager for a chat if there’s anything you want to talk about before you apply.

What's in it for me?

We are proud to offer an environment that is supportive and rewarding, working as part of a team who are passionate about the work they do to improve the lives of people in Somerset.

We offer great training and development opportunities, with supportive management. As well as this, we have some fantastic employee benefits available:

• We promote a healthy work-life balance and offer flexible working arrangements wherever possible, including working from home.
• Generous annual leave allowance, with the opportunity to purchase additional leave
• Staff discounts in gyms.
• Employee Assistance for the times you may need some support and a variety of employee wellbeing services.
• Auto enrolment onto our generous Pension Scheme and optional pension enhancement through our Additional Voluntary Contribution scheme.
• A Flexible Benefits Scheme via salary sacrifice to obtain a cycle for work and health screenings.
• My Staff Shop offering discounts in shops, online shopping, restaurants, cinema tickets, insurance benefits and more
  
  

Anything else I should know?

The salary for the role is Grade 13, ranging from £25,183 to 27,269 per annum

For an informal chat about the role, you can contact Alison Garbett. Service Manager Education Relationships and Early Years Lead. [email protected]

Interviews will take place on 15/07/2025

When completing your application/CV please provide your full employment history and ensure that any gaps in employment are explained. Please start with your current or most recent employment.

If you have all the information you need, just hit the apply button - we can’t wait to hear from you.

DBS information

This post requires a criminal background check via the Disclosure procedure.