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Cuppa needs Brits to lead their city's community
Tell us what your city's Brits need, look after the community group, run the get-togethers or speak for the community. Four voluntary roles in 20 cities, one WhatsApp message to apply.
Think back to your first fortnight abroad. Somebody told you which bank would open an account without a local credit history, which pub shows the Six Nations at a sensible hour, and which neighbourhood not to sign a lease in. Nobody paid them to answer. They were another Brit who'd been there a bit longer and remembered what it was like.
ExpatCuppa is looking for those people in every city we cover, from Sydney and Dubai to Málaga and Toronto, to help lead the British community where they live. Four roles, all voluntary. Pick your city, pick a role, send us a message.
What ExpatCuppa is
ExpatCuppa is the community for Brits living abroad: practical city guides for 20 cities, guides to the UK rules that follow you abroad (HMRC, the State Pension, votes for life, property back home), and free community groups in 20 countries. It's run by the same team behind our sister sites for Australians and Americans abroad.
One thing to be clear about. The guides are ours to research, write and publish, and some pages feature partner businesses that pay to be there, always marked as partners. None of that has anything to do with the volunteer roles. Your work goes to the Brits in your city, not to our partners, and no volunteer is ever asked to promote one.
Why the roles are unpaid
There's no salary, commission or referral fee in any of these roles. Part of the reason is practical: plenty of Brits abroad are on a visa that ties them to one employer or doesn't allow paid work at all, such as a dependant's pass or a retirement visa. Community work is open to everyone.
The bigger reason is principle. A community group run by somebody paid to run it turns into a sales channel. Our groups work because the people looking after them are members first.
And we're not asking anyone to do our job for free. The writing and publishing are ours. What we can't do from the outside is know what Brits in Paphos, Bangkok or Zurich actually need. That's the part only you can give us.
The four roles
Take one or more. Most cities have room for all four.
Editor
A few messages a month
You don't write for us. You tell us what's missing: the visa trap nobody warned you about, the school question every new family asks, the local rule that catches Brits out. We research, write and publish, and credit you by name.
Moderator
A few minutes a day
You read your city's community group daily, approve the posts that belong and remove the spam. Moderators see the same questions come round again and again, which makes them the best judges of the guide we should write next.
Event organiser
One evening a month, roughly
Remembrance Sunday, the King's Birthday, Bonfire Night, Six Nations, FA Cup final and Wimbledon screenings, a monthly pub quiz. We plan each event with you, then it's yours to run. Every event is open to the whole group, and none carries a sales pitch.
Ambassador
A few hours a week
The first person the community comes to. You keep in touch with the British embassy or consulate, the British Chamber of Commerce or British business group, the Royal British Legion branch, the clubs and the British-run businesses in your city, share their events in the group and coordinate the other volunteers there.
What you get
- Something worth doing. Many Brits abroad followed a partner's job and left their own career behind. Leading your city's community is real work with a visible result, and it reads as leadership on a CV, not a gap.
- Connections you can't buy. Ambassadors and organisers deal directly with the embassy, the business groups and the people who matter in the community. Those relationships are yours.
- A place in your community. Within a few months you're the person new arrivals are told to ask.
Who we're looking for
You've lived in your city long enough to have opinions, ideally a year or more. You know its British community, the clubs, the pubs and the gossip. You have a few hours a week that are actually free, and you'd like the next lot of arrivals to have it easier than you did. No qualifications or writing experience needed. Reliability matters more than either: a moderator who disappears for three weeks does more damage than none at all.
Apply on WhatsApp
Pick your city and your role. This opens WhatsApp with your message ready; we reply, talk it through and introduce you to whoever is already there.