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The Family Toolkit

Everything for families near you. Free.

The free days out. The money you didn't know you could claim. The good local businesses. And the answers, for the week you end up needing them.

Get it free

A separate edition for each area covered, with more on the way. Everywhere else gets the hundreds of services that work anywhere in the UK. Hundreds of the services work anywhere in the UK, so it is worth having wherever you are. No account, no app store, about thirty seconds.

The Family Toolkit

Keep scrolling inside the phone

You shouldn't have to know somebody who knows.

Right now it's pot luck. The right worker, or the right post in a local group. This is everything they knew, on your phone, for nothing.
Apriel Louise Apriel Louise Social worker, and the one behind The Family Toolkit

I spent years being the person families got sent to. And honestly, a lot of that job was just knowing things. Which number gets answered. Whether they'd want ID. Whether I could refer or it had to come from the GP.

None of it was written down anywhere. It was in a drawer of leaflets that were mostly out of date, and the rest of it was in my head. Which meant a family only got the full picture if they happened to be sat with somebody who'd been doing it long enough to have built it up. Anybody newer, and they got a fraction of it, through no fault of their own.

That never sat right with me. So I've spent the last year writing all of it down properly, checking every single one, and putting it somewhere anybody can get to it.

It's free because I want it in as many hands as possible. Local businesses pay to be listed on their own page, and they're the reason it can stay that way for everybody else. It's still growing every week too, with more services and more towns going in.

Have a look through

Six files. Open whichever you like.

Just five of the three hundred

Most people find something in the first ten minutes.

Here are five, picked at random. There are three hundred more where these came from.

A free book a month, posted to your child. Right through till they're five. Ask around your mum friends, hardly any of them will have heard of it.
Broadband at half price. Water bill capped. And you can switch broadband mid contract without paying to leave. Funnily enough, they don't tend to mention that bit.
Six weeks of summer, sorted. Free clubs with a hot meal, free swimming, museums, parks, library sessions. The ones that get booked up weeks ahead by the people who know.
Courses that change what you can go for. English, maths, digital, all fully funded. There's help towards childcare and travel too, and almost nobody thinks to ask.
Grants you've never heard of. There are thousands of little charities handing out money, matched to your trade, your town or your child. Takes ten minutes to check.
Why it's not just another list

Everywhere tells you it exists. This tells you how to get it.

Support Hub
“no food till payday”what you typed
Food bank voucher lineFree · Same day · Voucher needed
Good food pantry£5 a week · Walk in
Household Support FundFree · Apply online

Looking it up yourself

  • A name, an address, a number
  • Opening times from whenever somebody last touched the page
  • Nothing about whether you need a referral
  • Nothing about who's allowed to give you one
  • Nothing about ID, proof or paperwork
  • Three Facebook groups and a council page from 2023
  • Filed under what it's called, so you've got to know the name first
  • No way of telling if it's still going

The Family Toolkit

  • The real hours, including which days it's actually staffed
  • Walk in, ring up, or referral only, said up front
  • Exactly who can refer you, so you can stop guessing
  • What to take, right down to how they want the bank statement
  • The form, walked through step by step
  • The catch that gets applications knocked back
  • Type what's actually going on and it finds it
  • Checked against the source, with the date on it
0of local services, gathered in one place
0of forms walked through
Mostgo straight to the application
Everyneed, days out to crisis
The half people say they'd have paid for

The SEN Hub.

Six services in a fortnight and you end up exactly where you started. This is the map nobody hands you.

SEN Hub · What to look into
14 things found
DLA for childrenForm walked through · Worth checking
Carer’s AllowanceYou may qualify
Council tax reductionRarely offered, worth asking
Blue BadgeApply online

The EHCP, finally explained

How to ask. Why the legal test is far lower than they let on. The deadlines they're quietly missing. How to appeal and win.

Council policy doesn't beat the law.

Special schools, without the wasted term

Which ones are near you and what each is really for. Whether they need a diagnosis. Plus the ten questions to ask on the visit.

Get it in writing. Anything said out loud won't help you at a tribunal.

DLA, PIP, blue badge. Line by line

Written by somebody who's sat at kitchen tables filling them in with parents who'd already given up once.

Describe the worst days, not the average ones.

Also in there

The good local businesses.

Soft play, tutors, driving instructors, photographers, party places, garages. The ones actually worth knowing about round here.

They keep it free

Businesses have their own tab, and what they pay is what keeps the whole thing free for families.

Picked one at a time

I accept or turn down every single one myself. If I don't think a business would genuinely be useful to families, it doesn't go on.

Run something yourself?

These are your customers. Ask about a listing and tell me where you're based.

The practical bit

Getting it, sharing it, and everything else.

Two minutes, then it lives on your phone

Put it on your home screen.

It'll sit there with your other apps, open full screen, and still work when you've no signal. Pick your phone and I'll show you.

Go on then. It's free.

Free
No account. No app store. Nothing to cancel. Get it free

Works on any phone, tablet or laptop. Add it to your home screen and it opens like an app, even when you've no signal.

Work for a team or a school and want your own area adding? Tell me where you are and I'll look at building your edition next.

Free. No account, about thirty seconds.

Get it free