Insight: why do deaf employees have the added job of arranging their own access support? (BSL)

There’s a part of my job that no one really sees.

On paper, I work in the charity sector. I care about the work, the people, the impact we’re trying to make. My role is busy, varied and sometimes stressful. But what doesn’t appear in my job description is the second job I seem to have involuntarily taken on: managing my own access.

I’m deaf, and I rely on support such as British Sign Language interpreters and communication support to do my job properly. In theory, that support is funded through Access to Work.  But in practice, I am the one organising it.

That means booking interpreters for meetings, often across multiple platforms and agencies, sometimes with very little notice. It means coordinating diaries, confirming assignments, chasing confirmations, and rearranging when plans inevitably change.

It also means keeping track of who attended what, collecting invoices, checking they match what was agreed, and sending them off for payment. Then comes the follow-up—because payments are often delayed—and sometimes even more chasing when things stall again.

None of this is the work I was hired to do.

It’s hard to explain how much space it takes up, not just in time but in my head. I find myself constantly planning ahead: Do I have support booked for next week’s meetings? What about that last-minute call just added to the calendar? Has that invoice been submitted? Has it been paid? Did I miss an email?

Meanwhile, my hearing colleagues simply turn up to work and do their jobs.

They don’t have to build their working week around access logistics. They don’t spend breaks chasing invoices or rebooking support. They don’t worry that their participation depends on whether an email was answered in time or whether an agency had availability.

I try not to compare too much, but the unfairness of it all is really hard to ignore. It often feels like I am working two roles at the same time—one visible, one invisible—and only one of them is formally recognised or understood as “work”.

There is also a stress that comes from the financial side of access that is rarely talked about. When invoices are delayed, interpreters are sometimes left waiting weeks or even months for payment.

Understandably, this creates tension. I have sometimes received irate messages from interpreters or agencies who are frustrated about non-payment, even though the delay sits within the system rather than me!

In some cases, interpreters have refused to take further bookings until outstanding payments are resolved. That leaves me scrambling to find replacements at short notice, often in already tight schedules, while also trying to resolve the payment issue in the background.

Sometimes it feels like a small administrative task can turn into a chain of additional tasks—each one dependent on the previous step being confirmed, approved, or acknowledged. A simple meeting can generate emails, booking confirmations, interpreter coordination, invoice tracking, and so on. If anything slips in that chain, it all falls back on me to fix it.

There is also the issue of backdating payments and correcting errors when something hasn’t been logged correctly or an invoice doesn’t match the agreed booking.

That often means extra phone calls, more emails, and additional coordination with Access to Work, agencies, and finance teams. These are conversations that take time, attention, and persistence—usually squeezed into the same working day as everything else I am supposed to be doing.

It raises a difficult question: is this fair?

I don’t think anyone is deliberately making things harder. My colleagues are supportive, and my organisation wants to be inclusive. But the structure itself seems to assume that I will take on responsibility for managing my own access needs alongside my job.

It’s assumed that I will be the coordinator, administrator, troubleshooter, and sometimes mediator between multiple systems that don’t always align.

And if I don’t do it, what is the alternative?

If I don’t organise it, it doesn’t happen. If it doesn’t happen, I miss out on meetings, decisions, conversations, and opportunities to contribute. So I keep going.

But I often find myself wondering what would change if this wasn’t solely my responsibility.

What if access support was managed centrally within organisations, rather than sitting on the shoulders of individual employees? What if there was dedicated administrative support to handle bookings, invoices, and coordination with agencies and funding systems?

What if communication access was treated as core infrastructure, rather than an additional task layered onto the individual?

Even small shifts could make a difference: better planning cycles, clearer internal processes, shared responsibility for scheduling, and recognition that access takes time—not just in delivery, but in administration and this time should be accounted for.

I don’t have all the answers. And I know the systems are complicated, with funding rules and practical constraints. But I keep coming back to the same feeling: the current setup quietly builds an extra workload into my job description that my hearing colleagues simply do not have.

It is not just about access to meetings. It is about access to time, energy, and mental space.

And I can’t help wondering how much more work could actually get done—by me and others in similar roles—if that hidden workload didn’t exist at all.

This blog has been written anonymously as part of the Insight series – created by Assistant editor Rebecca A Withey.

If you have a story, experience or viewpoint you would like to anonymously share please email Rebecca on  rebecca@rawithey.com

Image courtesy of Pexels.