Interviews for this role will be held in person on Tuesday 1st September at The Lewis Street Office, Cardiff. This will be a full-day assessment event, providing an opportunity for you to meet colleagues and gain insight into the role through a visit to a live Community Payback project. You will be required to arrive at 09:00am, with the morning dedicated to the site visit. Your interview will then take place in the afternoon. Please note that interviews will only be conducted on this date. You must be available for the full day, as we are unable to offer alternative dates or reschedule appointments.
Please note that all salaries are as advertised and are non-negotiable, for new starters joining the service you will commence at the bottom of the scale. If you have any concerns regarding the salary range, please ensure these are raised during the interview process.
Make a Meaningful Impact Every Day
Are you looking for a role w your leadership can truly change lives and strengthen communities. As a Community Payback Supervisor, you’ll play a vital part in helping people on probation rebuild their futures while delivering visible improvements across local areas.
This is a hands on, people focused role w you’ll supervise and support individuals completing unpaid work as part of their unpaid work sentence. Through your guidance, they’ll gain valuable skills, experience a sense of purpose, and contribute to projects that benefit the wider public helping to reduce reoffending and aid rehabilitation.
You’ll lead teams working on a wide range of community-based projects, including:
- Landscaping and gardening
- Sports pitch maintenance
- Cooking and food preparation
- Woodland preservation
- Public Park and coastal pathway maintenance
- Church and sports club renovation
- Painting and decorating
- Flood prevention and public area maintenance and improvements
- Small building work
- Beach surveys
- Supporting hospitals and residential homes
- Manufacturing garden furniture and other items
- Grow plants and vegetables on allotments
- Work in partnership with local and National Charities
In addition to practical supervision, basic IT skills are essential to ensure clear communication between internal departments, partner organisations, and beneficiaries. Accurate and timely information sharing helps maintain safety, track progress, and deliver a joined-up service that supports rehabilitation and community confidence.
Every project is an opportunity to make a positive difference whether it’s restoring a local green space, helping maintain vital public facilities, or giving someone the tools to turn their life around. If you’re motivated by purpose, enjoy both indoor and outdoor working and with a diverse range of people, and want a job w your actions directly contribute to safer, stronger communities, we’d love to hear from you.
**Please note: Candidates must hold a full UK Manual Driving Licence when applying for this role, this is a mandatory technical requirement in order to carry out this role. We cannot accept candidates who hold an automatic Driving Licence only.**
A career in community payback gives you the power to make a positive impact on the lives of People on Probation as well as your community. People come from all walks of life to form one team in the Probation Service.
It's all about supporting People on Probation on their journey and making your community a better place. Whether that's building benches or cleaning the streets, you're t because you genuinely want to help.
If this sounds like you, apply now.
If you are successful in the recruitment process to join the Probation Service, your starting salary will be £28,064, Pro-Rata for Part-Time roles.
On a typical day, you’ll spend up to 7 hours supervising a group at a Community Payback unpaid work placement. Post holders may be required to undertake weekend working as part of their normal pattern of working.
Working pattern
The Community Payback supervisor role is accommodated to people on probation who work or have caring responsibilities. Community Payback projects run 7 days a week tfore you will: work frequent weekends, and you may be asked to cover some evenings. You will be paid a higher rate of 50% for weekend days you do work.
In this role, the pace of our work means that rest breaks don’t always happen in the standard way. When this happens, we make sure your wellbeing is looked after.
Your wellbeing really matters to us, so we want to be open about this from the outset. If you’re someone who enjoys a varied, active role w no two days are the same, this is a great environment to make a real difference while being fully supported.
The Probation Service offers the opportunity for annual pay progression through a Competency Based Framework (CBF), which if eligible, will see your pay increase. CBF is designed to enable you to move up through the pay band range as your competence grows.
New entrants are expected to join on the minimum of the pay band.
Probation Service also increase their pay band ranges annually in line with Civil Service Pay guidance, which will also apply an increase to band pay ranges w applicable.
Overview of the job
This is an operational role directly supervising work groups of offenders serving a community sentence. This may include driving service vehicles to transport people or equipment. The post holder will be responsible for all work site supervision tasks and will work with service users to ensure that all tasks are carried out to the best of their ability. This will include working alongside people to demonstrate good practice as necessary.
For further information on the summary, responsibilities, activities, duties of the role and the Civil Service Success Profile Criteria which will be used in the assessment process, please refer to the full Job Description Attachment.
Right to work in the UK
You must have the right to work in the UK and Civil Service (https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/nationality-rules).
Skilled Worker visa changes from 22 July 2025
In accordance with current immigration rules, this role is not eligible for a new Skilled Worker visa.
From 22 July 2025, the Government introduced changes to the eligibility criteria for Skilled Worker visas. As a result:
HM Prison and Probation Service (HMPPS) cannot consider sponsoring you to work as a community payback supervisor unless you have held a Skilled Worker visa prior to the 22 July 2025 changes.
If you have held a Skilled Worker visa continuously, please raise this during your pre-employment checks and your eligibility will be assessed in accordance with the immigration rules and transitional provisions in place.
If you apply to be a community payback supervisor and you have not held a Skilled Worker visa prior to 22 July 2025, you will need to consider your options for obtaining and/or maintaining your right to work in the UK in light of these changes.
If your application is successful, you will need to ensure that you have and maintain the legal right to live and work in the Civil Service and in the United Kingdom.
HMPPS will continue to comply with UK Immigration Rules applied in the UK and Civil Service. You can read more about Skilled Worker visas and the eligibility criteria .
Civil Service recruitment: nationality rules
Civil Service
This guide is intended to assist departments with managing their responsibilities on nationality rules related to Civil Service recruitment.
You can read more about Skilled Worker visas and the eligibility criteria (https://www.gov.uk/skilled-worker-visa)
About us:
The work is varied, challenging and meaningful and comes with job security, great benefits and career progression opportunities - not to mention the chance to make a real difference to people’s lives and our communities.
To hear more about a day in the life of a Community Payback Supervisor, : https://vimeo.com/728198635?fl=pl&fe=sh
About the Recruitment Process
To apply to this role you will be required to complete a short application form and detail responses to two Civil Service Behaviour and one Experience based questions.
Your application will be sifted once the application deadline has d. You will then receive further instruction on the progress and outcome of your application.
Take a look at a short video about Community Payback Supervisor : https://vimeo.com/663030374?fl=pl&fe=sh
If in the event we receive a high volume of applications, we may only assess candidates against the lead behaviour. T is also no guarantee that you will progress to the next stages of the recruitment process; however, we will keep you informed at each stage.
About the role
Community Payback Supervisors will work with a diverse mix of individuals, so it’s important that you’re empathetic, a good communicator and happy to take the lead.
It’s all about supporting offenders on their journey and making your community a better place. Whether that’s building benches or cleaning the streets, you’re t because you genuinely want to help people.
As a Community Payback supervisor, you’ll be at the heart of this work, leading small teams to complete their unpaid work hours.
You’ll supervise and motivate them to complete a range of manual tasks to pay back for the harm they’ve caused. These tasks could include clearing overgrowth to make public spaces safer, restoring community facilities such as sports halls and playgrounds, planting trees or laying flowerbeds, and litter picking and graffiti removal
