Special circumstances

If you have a requirement to train in a particular location, you may wish to be considered for special circumstances.

We're implementing a process across all national dental recruitment to ensure that applicants with special circumstances and a requirement to train in a particular location are treated in a fair and consistent way.

For Dental Foundation Training, please refer to the DFT national applicant guide.

Any applicant who falls into one of the following eligibility criteria will be pre-allocated into the post, subject to it meeting the requirements of their training programme:

Criterion 1

The applicant is the primary carer for someone who is disabled, as defined by the Equality Act 2010.

Criterion 2

The applicant has a medical condition or disability for which ongoing follow up for the condition in the specified location is an absolute requirement.

Criterion 3

The applicant has a parental responsibility for a child or children under the age of 18.

Applying for special circumstances

Applicants wishing to be considered for special circumstances pre allocation should ensure that they state this on their application form and submit the required form and supporting evidence by email. Requests for consideration of special circumstances received in any other way will not be accepted.

Please refer to the Oriel resource bank for more information on applying for special circumstances.

Supporting evidence

Applicants wishing to be considered for special circumstances should complete the criterion appropriate special circumstances application form and forward this, together with the following supporting evidence, as a single scanned document, as soon as the application has been submitted to [email protected].

The deadline for receiving special circumstances requests for Round 1 is Thursday 2 February 2023.

Criterion 1 – Primary carer of someone with a disability

Written statement confirming your role as primary carer

The letter should be on headed paper from a general practitioner or social services professional. It should confirm the applicant’s role as primary carer for this person, together with confirmation of the disability and be dated within 6 months of the application deadline.

The examples below are taken from real special circumstances applications.

Care Plan

Care plan on headed paper from a general practitioner or social services professional, dated within 6 months of the application deadline. Where an official care plan is not available, details of caring responsibilities and activities should be provided, attested by the general practitioner of the person who is being cared for.

The examples below are provided to help you understand the requirements of a care plan, based on evidence submitted by applicants in previous recruitment rounds.

Alternatively, you can provide an Educational Health and Care Plan (EHCP) for the child being cared for or, where this is unavailable, confirmation that an assessment has taken place and that the development of the EHCP is in progress.

Proof of address e.g. driving licence, utility bill dated within 3 months of the application date must also be provided.

Criterion 2 – Medical condition or disability

Report written by the current medical specialist treating your condition or Occupational Health physician

The report must be provided on headed paper and must be current i.e. written for the purpose of this application. Older medical evidence will not be accepted as there is no way of the panel confirming that this is still the current situation.

The written report must contain all of the following information.

• Description of current medical condition or disability.
• Description of ongoing treatment and frequency – What treatment is required? Where is this delivered? How often is the applicant required to attend hospital?
• Explanation of the reasons why the follow up treatment cannot be delivered elsewhere in the UK.
• The impact transferring care elsewhere would have on the applicant.

It must also include where the applicant lives in adapted housing that could not be easily replicated elsewhere, confirmation of this from the GP or local council in written form, dated within 6 months of the application deadline. You will also provide proof of address e.g. driving licence, utility bill dated within 3 months of the application date.

If any of this information is missing, the special circumstances application will be rejected.

Criterion 3

You must be able to provide the following:

• Criterion 3 Request for Special Circumstances form

AND

• The full version of the birth certificate (detailing parent(s) name(s)) for each child. This is to confirm that the applicant is the parent of the child(ren) they have detailed. The birth certificate must also include the full name of the child. The short version of the birth certificate which contains only the child’s details will not be accepted.

AND

• For legal guardians, a copy of the legal document that confirms your status for the child named in the birth certificate. If you are a legal guardian then you may submit the short version of the birth certificate.

AND

• Statement confirming that you have significant caring responsibilities for the child(ren). This statement must be signed by someone who is in a position to confirm they have known the applicant for at least six months and has a professional working relationship* with the applicant and child(ren) and can confirm that s/he has a significant caring responsibility for a child or children under 18. This statement must be dated within six months of the application date.

AND

• Proof of current address, e.g. driving licence, utility bill dated within the last three months or council tax bill dated within the last twelve months of the application date.

*The signatory must:

• be over 18
• have a relevant professional working relationship with the applicant and their child(ren) e.g. Midwife, GP/Doctor, Head teacher, Social Worker
• not be related to the applicant by birth or marriage
• not be in a personal relationship with the applicant
• not live at the same address as the applicant.

Please note: This criterion is based on childcare. Pregnancy is not part of this criterion. An applicant whose sole circumstance is that she (or a partner) is currently pregnant will not be regarded as eligible.

It is expected that you and your child(ren) will remain at your current address and application for pre-allocation will be to programmes local to that address. If the request for pre-allocation is not local to your current address, relevant evidence must be supplied as to why caring arrangements could not continue as present.

If you and the child(ren) do not normally reside together, this should be referred to on the application form, and information supplied as to why the caring responsibilities remain equally significant.

Shared caring responsibilities

Criterion 1 joint application request for Special Circumstances form

AND

• Valid written statement on headed paper from a general practitioner or social services professional, dated within the last 6 months of the application date, confirming both applicants as primary carers for this person, together with confirmation of the disability

Documents that refer to carer or caring responsibilities will not be accepted

Primary caring responsibilities where conditions are not classed as disabilities under the Equality Act 2010 will not be considered

AND

• Valid care plan on headed paper from a general practitioner or social services professional, dated within the last 6 months of the application date.

Where an official care plan is not available, details of caring responsibilities and activities should be provided, attested by the general practitioner of the individual you are providing care for.

AND

• Proof of current address e.g. driving licence, utility bill dated within the last 3 months of the application date.

Fertility treatment

• Criterion 2 joint application request for Special Circumstances form

AND

• A report written by the current medical specialist offering the treatment, on headed paper, date in the last 6 months of the application date.

AND

• Proof of current address, e.g. driving licence or utility bill, dated within the last 3 months of the application date.

For all criteria you must also provide information on where the required location is and an acceptable travelling distance. If the required location is not the same as your current address (for example, you need a Foundation Training programme close to family as they will provide childcare) please explain why you need to be placed in a different area and provide proof of the address you need to be placed within a reasonable distance of (e.g. utility bill or bank statement dated within the last three months).

Joint application evidence

Joint applications will be permitted in the following circumstances:

• Shared caring responsibilities – where more than one applicant, in the same recruitment round share caring responsibilities for the same individual.
• Fertility treatment – where both parties in a relationship are undergoing fertility treatment and they are applying in the same recruitment round.

Outcomes

Special circumstances applications will be reviewed by a national eligibility panel and a decision on whether the application has been successful will be communicated. 

If you are unhappy with the decision of the national eligibility panel, you are permitted to submit an appeal to the national appeals panel. Appeals must be based on new evidence being submitted. The decision of the national appeals panel will be final. 

Allocation  

If approved as having special circumstances, you will be pre-allocated into the region of your choice, subject to the following criteria being met.

• You are deemed appointable at interview/selection centre. 

• You ranked highly enough to receive an offer e.g. if there are 10 posts available, applicant will need to rank in the top 10.   

You will also be considered to have ranked highly enough, where there are applicants ranked above yourself who would not be eligible to receive an offer due to limited preference choices and preferred posts being unavailable. 

Where Locum Appointment for Training posts are being appointed through the vacancy, the applicant must rank higher than the lowest ranked National Training Number (NTN) offer in order to be pre-allocated on the basis of approved special circumstances. 

• The region you wish to be allocated to can fulfil all requirements of the curriculum for the specialty for which you have applied.

If all of these conditions are met, you will be pre-allocated into your preferred region, before the main offers algorithm is run. You are pre-allocated to a region only. You are not guaranteed your preferred programme/post within that region. You will be offered the highest ranked post within that region that you would have been offered, had the normal offers process run. If you would not have been offered a post in the preferred region, you will be pre-allocated one of your ranked programmes within that region. 

If you do not rank highly enough to be offered a post in the first round of offers, you will be placed on a reserve list, pending more posts becoming available or offers being declined. There is no guarantee of matching special circumstances applicants to preferred locations after the first round of offers has been completed. An applicant without special circumstances who has accepted a post in the preferred location of an applicant with special circumstances will not be displaced to allow allocation of the applicant with approved special circumstances. 

When ranking preferences and have approved special circumstances, you must ensure that you only rank programmes/posts that you are willing to accept and undertake. You will be allocated based on these preferences. If it is not possible to pre-allocate an applicant with special circumstances, they will have opportunities throughout the recruitment process to amend their preferences, should they wish to be considered for appointment in another region.   

When selecting post preferences, you must ensure that you meet the eligibility for those posts.