If you have a background in care or community work, enjoy variety in your day and want to build a long-term career in healthcare without needing a clinical degree to get started, this is a role worth stopping for. Barts Health NHS Trust, one of the largest NHS trusts in England, is recruiting for a position that genuinely bridges hands-on patient care and independent working across some of East London’s most active healthcare sites.
The salary sits between £34,186 and £37,389 per year, which is a solid band for an assistant-level post and reflects the seniority and range of responsibility involved. Crucially, no formal qualifications beyond GCSE level are required, which makes this accessible to a broader pool of candidates than many NHS clinical roles. For international applicants, the trust has confirmed it will consider Skilled Worker visa sponsorship, making this one of the more realistic routes into NHS employment for those currently overseas.
What sets this apart from a standard support role is the geographic scope. The audiology service covers five London boroughs across Tower Hamlets, Hackney, Newham, Waltham Forest and Redbridge, with the postholder expected to carry out home visits to housebound patients alongside clinic-based work. That means no two days look the same, and the role carries a genuine degree of autonomy that you do not typically find at this level.
Job Overview
| Field | Details |
| Job Title | Senior Audiology Assistant (SATO) |
| Employer | Barts Health NHS Trust |
| Location | Royal London Hospital, Whitechapel, London (with community and domiciliary visits across East London) |
| Salary | £34,186 – £37,389 per year |
| Contract Type | Permanent |
| Hours | Full-time |
| Visa Sponsorship Status | Skilled Worker visa sponsorship available |
| Closing Date | 22 April 2026 |
| Interview Date | Not specified |
What You’d Actually Be Doing
This is a varied role that moves between clinic environments, community health centres and patients’ homes. Here is what the work looks like in practice:
- Running hearing aid repair clinics. You will hold dedicated sessions for adults who need their hearing aids adjusted, repaired or maintained. These can be fast-paced, with a steady flow of patients who may have waited some time for their appointment.
- Carrying out reassessments on existing hearing aid users. Rather than first-time diagnostics, you will follow up with established patients to check whether their current aids still meet their needs, updating records and flagging anything that requires escalation to an audiologist.
- Assisting with adult diagnostic testing. You will work alongside senior audiologists during hearing assessments, helping to set up and operate equipment and ensuring the session runs smoothly.
- Conducting domiciliary visits to housebound patients. A significant part of the role involves travelling independently to patients’ homes across East London to provide hearing aid maintenance. You will need your own car and a full clean driving licence for this.
- Maintaining and calibrating clinical equipment. You will be responsible for ensuring that testing equipment is in good working order, correctly calibrated and that any issues are reported promptly.
- Keeping accurate patient health records. Every patient interaction needs to be logged electronically. This includes updating files after home visits as well as in-clinic appointments.
- Supporting administrative functions. The team needs flexibility across clinical and admin work, so expect to help with scheduling, correspondence and general departmental administration on a regular basis.
- Planning and managing your own workload. This is not a role where someone hands you a daily task list. You will be expected to prioritise your own visits and clinic commitments within the framework set by your line manager.
Who They’re Looking For
Must-haves (essential criteria):
- GCSEs in maths and English, or an equivalent qualification
- A full, clean driving licence (this is non-negotiable given the domiciliary element)
- Demonstrable experience working with members of the public in any setting
- Strong written and verbal communication skills, including professional electronic communication
- Good IT skills and the ability to update digital patient records
- The ability to work calmly and professionally at all times, treating all patients equally
- A methodical approach to planning and the ability to meet deadlines
- Willingness to work as part of a multidisciplinary team while also exercising independent judgement
Nice-to-haves (desirable criteria):
- Previous experience in an NHS or broader healthcare setting
- Experience supporting elderly people in a care home or community care environment
- Deaf awareness training or knowledge
- A genuine interest in gaining further qualifications in audiology or a related field
If you meet the essentials but do not tick every desirable box, do not let that put you off. Barts has made clear that full training will be provided, and the desirable criteria are a bonus, not a barrier.
What Most Applicants Get Wrong
- Treating the application like a standard admin or support role rather than a clinical one. Audiology assistants operate within regulated healthcare environments, and the NHS person specification reflects that. Generic applications that focus only on “good communication skills” and “working in a team” without referencing healthcare values, patient safety or clinical accuracy are the ones that get filtered out first. Your CV needs to reflect an understanding of what a care-facing NHS role actually demands.
- Underplaying the driving requirement. A full clean driving licence is listed as essential, and so is the willingness to use your own car for domiciliary visits. Candidates who gloss over this in their application, or fail to mention it in their supporting statement, raise immediate red flags. If you have the licence, say so explicitly. If there are points on it, get ahead of the question rather than hoping it will not come up.
- Walking into the interview without any awareness of the Barts Health Trust or the audiology service footprint. This team covers five London boroughs and operates across multiple hospital and community sites. Candidates who arrive knowing nothing about the Trust’s scale, its NHS values framework or the communities the audiology service supports tend to come across as disinterested. Interviewers at this level notice.
How to Apply (and Actually Get Noticed)
- Read the full person specification carefully before writing a single word of your supporting statement. The NHS shortlisting process is criteria-based, meaning reviewers tick off each essential and desirable point against your application. If you do not address something explicitly, it is marked as not evidenced.
- Apply through the official Trac.jobs portal linked at the bottom of the original listing. Create an account if you do not already have one, as your application will be saved there and any correspondence from the recruitment team will go through the same portal.
- Write a supporting statement that maps directly to the person specification. Take each essential criterion and give a brief, concrete example of when you have demonstrated it. Do not assume anything is obvious from your CV alone.
- Address the driving requirement proactively. State clearly that you hold a full clean driving licence and confirm that you are willing and able to use your personal vehicle for domiciliary visits. This matters enough to warrant its own sentence.
- If you are applying from overseas, make sure you address your visa status clearly. The Trust has confirmed it welcomes applications from those requiring Skilled Worker sponsorship, so there is no need to obscure this, but you should be straightforward about your current situation.
- Submit before the 22 April 2026 deadline. NHS recruitment portals can be slow or unpredictable, so aim to submit at least 48 hours before the closing date to avoid technical issues.
- After submitting, keep an eye on your Trac.jobs account and the email address you registered with. Interview invitations and shortlisting decisions are sent through the portal.
Visa and Eligibility
Barts Health NHS Trust has confirmed that applications from candidates requiring current Skilled Worker visa sponsorship are welcome and will be considered on equal terms with all other applicants. This is a meaningful commitment, not a footnote, and makes this one of the more accessible NHS roles for international candidates looking to establish themselves in the UK healthcare sector.
That said, Skilled Worker sponsorship is not automatic. You will need to meet the Home Office eligibility requirements, including the salary threshold, which this role satisfies at the lower end of the pay band. Candidates who have lived continuously or cumulatively in another country for 12 months or more over the past ten years will also need to provide a criminal records certificate from that country as part of the visa application process.
For a full breakdown of the Skilled Worker route and what you need to qualify, visit the UK Visas and Immigration website. Guidance on criminal record checks for overseas applicants is available separately via GOV.UK.
Frequently Asked Questions
Here are answers to the most common questions people ask about this Senior Audiology Assistant role at Barts Health NHS Trust, including eligibility, interview format, visa requirements and what to expect from the application process.
Do you need a degree or audiology qualification to apply for this NHS audiology assistant role?
No formal qualifications beyond GCSEs in maths and English are required for this role. The job listing explicitly states that full training will be provided to the successful applicant, including attendance at accredited external courses, making this one of the more accessible entry points into NHS audiology for candidates without specialist qualifications.
What does a Senior Audiology Assistant actually do day to day at Barts Health?
The role involves a mix of clinic-based work and independent community visits. On any given day, you might be running a hearing aid repair clinic at the Royal London Hospital in the morning and driving to a patient’s home in Newham or Waltham Forest in the afternoon to carry out maintenance for someone who cannot attend in person.
Is the driving licence requirement really essential, and can I use a hire car?
A full clean driving licence is listed as an essential requirement and the listing specifies that the postholder must use their own car for domiciliary visits. This appears to be a firm operational requirement rather than a preference, so candidates without a licence or a personal vehicle would not be eligible.
Will Barts Health NHS Trust sponsor a Skilled Worker visa for this role?
Yes. The job listing explicitly states that applications from those requiring current Skilled Worker sponsorship are welcome and will be considered alongside all other applications. The salary range of £34,186 to £37,389 meets the Home Office threshold for this visa category.
Does this role require a DBS check?
Yes. This post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act (Exceptions Order) 1975, and applicants will be required to undergo a Disclosure and Barring Service check as part of the pre-employment process. This is standard for NHS roles involving patient contact.
What is the NHS recruitment process like for this type of audiology support role?
NHS roles are typically recruited through a shortlisting process based on the person specification, followed by a structured interview using competency-based questions. For roles at this level, you may also be asked to demonstrate practical skills or situational judgement, though the specific interview format for this post has not been confirmed publicly.
Can I apply if I have experience in social care rather than a clinical healthcare setting?
Yes. The person specification lists experience in a care home or with elderly people as desirable rather than essential, and broader experience working with the general public is what is required at the essential level. A background in social care, community support or domiciliary care would be directly relevant and worth highlighting in your supporting statement.
How does the application process work through Trac.jobs?
Applications are submitted via the Trac.jobs platform, which is the NHS’s primary recruitment portal. You will need to create an account, complete your profile and submit both your CV and a supporting statement before the closing date of 22 April 2026. All correspondence, including shortlisting outcomes and interview invitations, is sent through the platform.
What makes Barts Health NHS Trust a good employer for this type of role?
Barts Health is one of the largest NHS trusts in the country, covering a high-volume and diverse patient population across East London. For someone looking to develop in audiology or wider NHS healthcare, the scale of the service means genuine scope for training, career progression and exposure to a broad range of clinical environments.
Official Application Link
You can apply directly for this position through the official NHS recruitment portal. The full listing is accessible via the Senior Audiology Assistant (SATO) role at Barts Health NHS Trust on Trac.jobs.
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