What we do

This is what we do and how it works.

Every week we record one hour of local news taken from the Echo and other local newspapers.

The news is recorded onto CDs or USB flash drives (memory sticks) which are sent out in zipped plastic wallets, post free, to people with a visual impairment; blind or partially sighted.

We record on Thursday evenings. The discs or sticks are posted out on Fridays and our listeners should receive them on Saturday morning.

The postal wallet holds an address card on the front. Our address is on the back of that card. Our listeners are asked to slide the card out, turn it over and replace it behind the clear plastic 'window' and post it back to us.

It is a free service and there is no postage to pay.

Every six weeks there is a second disc or stick included. This is our Magazine issue, another hour filled with interesting feature articles from the Essex area and beyond.

We ask our listeners to return the CDs or USB sticks to us in one of the postal wallets when they have finished with them. We take the CDs to a recycling plant in London so that they do not add to the landfill problem but the USBs are checked, cleaned and re-used

We are able to supply a simple 'Sovereign' USB player to listeners, cost free if necessary, and this is proving to be the easiest system for listeners to use.

Since December 2012 we have been based in the offices of the Citizens Advice Bureau, 1 Church Road, Southend-on-Sea,  SS1 2AL, and this is where the recordings are made.