About

Encompass is the trading name of Borders Direct Payment Agency. We have been supporting people using a Direct Payment since 1999. A Direct Payment is one of the four options of Self-directed Support.

We are a user-led organisation and over 50% of our board of directors is made up of users or carers.

We are a Scottish Registered Charity and a company limited by guarantee. We are an associate member of Self-directed Support Scotland.

We have built up an excellent reputation and pride ourselves in delivering a high quality, personalised and understanding service to our clients.

We cover the whole of the Scottish Borders region – Central, Cheviot, Teviot, Berwickshire and Peeblesshire. So, we provide services and advertise job vacancies for carers and personal assistants in towns like Galashiels and Selkirk, Kelso, Hawick, Duns and Peebles and the surrounding villages and rural areas.

A Brief History

Encompass is the trading name of Borders Direct Payment Agency (BDPA), It was set up in 1999 in the Scottish Borders to support disabled people and those with community care needs to make the best use of available funding to maximise their quality of life. The funds could be from:

Scottish Borders Council Social Work Department as Self-directed Support (SDS), including a Direct Payment (DP)
the Independent Living Fund (ILF)
private funds.

In 2006, a group of people, including some who managed a Direct Payment, their unpaid carers, Borders Direct Payment Agency employees, got together to look at the future of the organisation. It was decided to form an independent user-led company limited by guarantee, registered in Scotland as a charity. The company was incorporated in April 2008. It was initially based in Anderson’s Chambers in Galashiels but moved office space to Selkirk in 2023.

Membership of the company is open to anyone with an interest in its aims. The members elect a Board, of which 50 per cent receive a Direct Payment or are unpaid carers. An unpaid carer is anyone who cares, unpaid, for a friend or family member who due to illness, disability, a mental health problem or an addiction cannot cope without their support (this does not include paid care workers or those who are volunteering).