How We Operate

Like many charities and organisations, social media has become a key way for Scottish Autism to communicate with our supporters, to improve public awareness, understanding and acceptance of autism and to signpost people to appropriate support. We currently have an account on Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram, TikTok and Twitter and we also have a dedicated YouTube channel. Our accounts are monitored by the Marketing Team between the hours of Monday – Thursday 9am - 5pm, and between 9am – 4.30pm on a Friday.

In addition to our public pages, we also have three closed Facebook groups: Scottish Autism Affinity (exclusively for autistic people), Ask an Advisor and a Parents and Carers group. These closed groups are designed to be supportive and are in keeping with our core values of Compassion, Collaboration, Change Makers and Contribution.

Across all of these channels it is of upmost importance to us to ensure that all who engage with us feel safe and respected. It is with this in mind that we outline below what you can expect from our accounts and how we will engage with people through them.

If you or someone you know is in a crisis situation or is feeling suicidal, please read our Crisis Support Information.  

What can you expect from our social media pages?

• Current information about Scottish Autism’s work
• Information about wider initiatives relevant to autistic people and their families
• Information about our fundraising activities
• Information about our service developments
• Celebrations of success and shared moments of happiness and positivity in the lives of those we support
• Research facilitation requests from projects which have been through our ethics process at our Centre for Practice Innovation
• To be routed to alternative sources of support where possible
• To have timely and accurate responses to questions, concerns or issues raised via these platforms

Keeping Social Media a Safe Space

Constructive and respectful discussion is something that we welcome on our social media platforms and we want all of our supporters to enjoy the content we share on our channels in a safe manner. In order to do this we reserve the right to hide or delete inappropriate content where necessary, this includes:

• abusive messages
• offensive or discriminatory language; swearing, personal jibes, insults etc
• slanderous/derogatory/disrespectful comments
• self-promotion, advertising, spam or irrelevant links on our Facebook posts/groups
• comments which are off topic

Scottish Autism Supporters or Staff Members

We take the wellbeing of our employees very seriously. We therefore reserve the right to mute or block any user whose conduct impacts on the wellbeing of members of our social media community or our staff team. This decision lies with our Deputy Chief Executive Officer.

In addition to the above, we would like to outline how we will conduct ourselves via our social channels.

• Our staff will always respond professionally and courteously to comments
• If a user expresses a concern they will be given an initial response on the social media channel and offered the opportunity to discuss their concern “offline”. This is to allow a resolution to occur privately, protecting the individual’s personal affairs
• Scottish Autism is open to constructive criticism and will do all that we can to resolve any concerns
• As a charity, we promote the wellbeing of the individuals we support, including those who rely on our social media channels for contact, comfort and social engagement
• We recognise that social media is not always the best platform for effective communication and that misunderstandings can and do happen. We will be open to supporting people to get the best out of contacting Scottish Autism through social media including recommending use of alternative communication resources such as our advice line, live chat or email

Sharing Supporters Content

We regularly receive requests for us to share content from other groups or individuals. As we receive so many requests, unfortunately it is not possible for us to facilitate this unless it is from another charity, business or campaign we have a relationship and work closely with. We welcome you to post on our Facebook page wall where other people can view and comment on your post.

• If you have a research project you would like us to share please visit our Research Facilitation webpage to find out more
• If you have a fundraising enquiry please contact fundraising@scottishautism.org
• If you have a marketing enquiry please contact marketing@scottishautism.org

You can follow us on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, YouTube and LinkedIn by clicking on the links in the footer below.