Raising Money for SERV Herts & Beds
25th April 2017
At Garden Square, we are always keen to assist the local community wherever possible – this includes raising monies for local charity.
In March, we presented SERV Herts & Beds with a cheque for £589.47, monies that were raised by the shopping centre’s customers during our Christmas events last year.
SERV kindly helped with the setup of Garden Square’s Christmas grotto, along with charity volunteers Di Atkins and Jane McClennan.
Jack Philbin, Garden Square’s Centre Manager, said: “We were delighted that our shoppers raised £589.47 for SERV during events at the end of last year. The charity’s work is incredibly important to the community. Currently, SERV is averaging more than 20 call outs per week and rising. Each call out saves each hospital on average £75 – £100, so we’re pleased to be able to help relieve pressures on local facilities.”
SERV Herts & Beds – The Bloodrunners
SERV (Service by Emergency Response Volunteers) is a blood running service that is entirely funded by voluntary donations and by the generosity of the volunteers themselves.
SERV began operations in Hertfordshire and Bedfordshire on 10th January 2009, with the Bedford General Hospital as their first ‘customer’. They now serve most hospitals in the two counties, including Lister Hospital in Stevenage and the Queen Elizabeth II in Welwyn. They also provide support to four hospices to the Southern UK Milk Bank at Queen Charlotte & Chelsea Hospital, Hammersmith, and its donors.
The charity is staffed by approximately 80 rider/driver volunteers who pay £25 each to join, and receive no remuneration, meeting all their own fuel and servicing costs. They are supported by 12 controllers who take the calls from the hospitals, assign the riders/drivers and monitor their progress.
All volunteers must undergo route training and GMP training (blood handling), the latter being refreshed annually. In addition, motorcycle riders and car drivers must take an independent on-road assessment.
Duty Calls
Volunteer rider/drivers are on duty each night from 7pm to 7am and may take up to 2 calls during a shift, riding or driving up to 150 miles.
Controllers work the same hours at night, and a separate day controller covers 7am to 7pm, assigning available volunteers by use of a bulk SMS texting system. Human donor milk is handled using a web-based booking and tracking system.
“Thanks so much to Garden Square and its shoppers for the very generous donation to SERV Herts & Beds. It will be of great help to us to support our Rider Training programme.”John McCombe, Chairman of SERV Herts & Beds
In 2016, SERV supported the NHS by making, free of charge:
- Over 1,000 night-time blood and sample shipments
- Over 250 donor milk shipments, with 15 daytime milk riders covering more than 10,000 miles in the process
For more information about SERV, visit servhertsbeds.org.uk
