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Help the Aged and Zurich Community Trust have been working together since 2001, and in 2005 launched the hugely successful A Call in Time volunteering programme. A Call in Time is a telephone befriending service, where volunteers call their older friend on a regular basis. Since its launch in 2005, the programme has provided a lifeline to hundreds of older people.
Following the success of the pilot phase of the project, Help the Aged and Zurich Community Trust now plan to promote the employee volunteering model pioneered through A Call in Time to other organisations.
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Zurich Partnership 
As part of the partnership, last year Help the Aged and Zurich Community Trust commissioned a report into the impact of the A Call in Time volunteering programme. The research, carried out by the Centre for Health Promotion Research at Leeds Metropolitan University, has shown that telephone befriending services provide a vital service for older people who are socially isolated and lonely. Receiving a regular phone call has been shown to increase self-confidence, reduce fear and anxiety, and help older people re-engage with their community. As one beneficiary says; ‘You can’t put it into words. It’s just knowing that there’s somebody there, especially when you live on your own. It’s just priceless.’
