A quick heads-up. Samaritans closed its UK email support service on 30 September.
If you've trained with us as a mental health first aider, you've probably pointed someone towards Samaritans at some point. So it's worth knowing that the email address doesn't reach a Samaritan any more. Anyone who emails gets an automatic reply asking them to phone instead.
What's still there:
Phone: 116 123, free, any time of day or night. It's still the quickest way to reach a Samaritan.
Online chat: it's still a small pilot, though. It isn't always open, and who gets in is decided at random, so you can't promise anyone they'll get through.
If someone would rather write than talk, Shout is free and open 24/7. Text SHOUT to 85258.
Their reason makes sense. With email there was always a wait for a reply, and someone in crisis needs help now.
The old address will still be on plenty of wellbeing pages, intranets, staff kitchen posters, signposting cards and training slides. So this week, have a look at what your workplace uses. Take the email address out and put 116 123 in. It's usually a five-minute job, and you don't need to wait for someone else to spot it first.
We've already updated the Suicide and Crisis section of our resource library on the online learning platform.
