Work as a prison officer at HMP Send

About HMP Send

In a rural setting, about 6 miles from the busy town of Woking in Surrey, HMP Send is a prison for adult women, aged 21 and older. The prison accommodates both women who have committed low level crimes such as shoplifting and are serving short sentences, and those who are serving long sentences.

With a capacity of 255, HMP Send is 1 of 8 public sector closed conditions women’s prisons in England.

Inside HMP Send

As a prison officer working in a women’s prison, you will face some specific challenges you may not come across in a men’s prison. Many women in custody have had challenging or traumatic experiences that have triggered their offending. Being able to engage and support individuals with difficult emotional and mental health issues is an important skill to have as a prison officer.

To best support women during their stay at Send prison, there are two specialist units:

• a dedicated therapeutic community in which staff, working alongside NHS colleagues, take a trauma-informed approach to working with prisoners
• a specific unit for prisoners with personality disorders

To support prisoners to make the best use of their time in custody, HMP Send provides them with a broad range of learning opportunities, including:

• gaining qualifications in core curriculum subjects, such as English and Maths, through to higher education courses via the Open University
• studying a range of vocational subjects such as business administration, customer service, catering, horticulture, and hairdressing and beauty

To increase their changes of finding a job when they leave custody, prisoners also have access to a range of on-site work opportunities, such as working in the farms and gardens area, kitchen, laundry, or hairdressing salon.

Staff benefits

As an employee of HMP Send, you will have access to a range of facilities and employee benefits including:

• free, onsite parking
• use of a free, onsite gym
• excellent training and career progression

How to get to HMP Send

With plenty of onsite parking and good road links, Send prison is just a short 15 to 20 minute drive from both Guildford and Woking. Aldershot, Camberley and Farnham are also just around 30 minutes way. And Bracknell, Crawley and Sevenoaks can be reached in under an hour.

Trains run every 30 minutes from London Waterloo to Clandon station, which is 2 miles from the prison. Woking station is about 6 miles from the prison.

Find HMP Send on a map (opens in a new window).