Suffolk Local Offer

What is a Short Breaks Personal Budget?

In addition to providing grants to activity providers, we also provide Short Breaks Personal Budgets directly to eligible families.

A Short Breaks Personal Budget is a sum of money paid directly to eligible families as a contribution to help your child access short breaks and to give you a break from your caring responsibilities.

Am I eligible?

Any parent carer of a child aged 0-18 with Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND) who lives in Suffolk can apply for an Activities Unlimited Short Breaks Personal Budget, although not all families who apply for a Personal Budget are eligible to receive one; budgets are reserved for those children, young people and families with moderate to significant needs.

How much could I receive? 

Please note: This information below is intended as a guide only, to help parents, carers and practitioners understand the indicators we typically see at each level.

Each application is assessed across a range of areas, so the personal budget offered may vary slightly. Amounts and criteria published here are valid for the current financial year only, and may vary year on year due to local or national changes.

School age and post 16 budget indicators

Pre-school age budget indicators

How do you assess applications?

Our online application form asks a range of questions about you and your child’s needs. We use a range of indicators to try and build as full a picture of your family’s needs as possible, whilst keeping the application process as simple for families to complete as we can.

The information provided is grouped into nine indicator areas:

  • Parent/Carer self-assessed need
  • Child/young person self-assessed need
  • Education setting / type
  • Level of Education High Needs Funding received
  • Parent / Carer DLA/PIP
  • Child / Young Person DLA/PIP
  • Social, Emotional and Mental Health Services Involvement
  • Health Services Involvement
  • Social Care Services Involvement

The parent carer self-assessment is based on the needs of the main carer completing the form. It considers the following:

  • The parent carer’s own health needs.
  • If they have support from family and friends,
  • If they care for others
  • The impact of their caring role in accessing their community, being able to work, quality of sleep and spending time with others.

The self- assessment of the child’s needs asks questions about the following areas:

  • Sensory
  • Physical Health
  • Mobility
  • Communication
  • Self-care
  • Social and Emotional Health and Wellbeing
  • Learning Disabilities
  • The type of education support in place
  • Services the child is accessing plus how often
  • The child’s level of disability benefit.

Once the application is submitted, the system grades each of these indicators between 1-5 depending on the severity of need in this area, and these then generates an overall score. This score determines the eligibility for a Personal Budget and the level of budget to be awarded.


If you have a query that isn’t answered on these pages, you can email AU at info@activities-unlimited.co.uk or call us on 01473 260026.