Hull & East Riding Citizens Advice Bureau

Provides free, independent, confidential and impartial advice to everyone on their rights and responsibilities.

It values diversity, promotes equality and challenges discrimination.

The Service aims:-

To provide the advice people need for the problems they face. To improve the policies and practices that affect people’s lives.

1 Hull & East Riding Citizens Advice Bureau

The Bureau is a member of the national Citizens Advice Network which forms the largest advice giving network in the UK comprising over 3000 advice centres throughout England, Wales and Northern Ireland. Nationally, 20,000 volunteers work in the bureaux, together with paid staff including bureau managers and specialist advisers. Each Bureau is an independent charity, supported by Citizens Advice which is the operating name of the National Association of Citizens Advice Bureaux.

Hull & East Riding Citizens Advice Bureau provides free, confidential and impartial advice.

The aims of the service are:

to provide the advice people need for the problems they face - and equally

to improve the policies and practices that affect people‟s lives through advocacy and social policy.

The Bureau employs almost 50 full and part-time paid staff and over 150 volunteer staff and provides its services from permanent offices in Hull, Beverley, Bridlington and Goole and over 31 outreach venues in Hull and the East Riding.

Some facts and figures:-

In 2012 / 13 the Bureau assisted over 14,000 clients with over 17,000 different enquiries.

But many more people benefit from our work:

individuals who volunteer improve their confidence, skills and employment prospects

household finances are managed better through our financial capability sessions

communities benefit indirectly from our advocacy work, which influences decision- makers and policy.

In Hull, the top 5 enquiry areas were:-

Debt 35%

Benefits 24%

Housing 8%

Employment 7%

Family and relationships 7% 2 The Bureau is supported by over 150 volunteers in roles such as: Trustee, Assessor, Advisor, Administrator, Receptionist, Social Policy Officer and Information Assistant.

The value of our volunteers‟ contribution is worth over £900,000 to the local economy.

Volunteers provide over 1,100 hours per week of time to support local residents.

Volunteer training increases the knowledge and confidence of volunteers and paid staff working across all communities, enable better diagnostic of the problems people face, improve the knowledge of advice services available to the clients and improve the employability of the people involved, who will have an accredited skill.

Volunteering for the CAB is a proven pathway to employment and education. On average, 30% of volunteers trained by the bureau move on into employment and 12% into further education each year.

In 2012/13 we achieved £7,118,808 of financial gain for our clients:

£1,311,333 of increased benefit and tax credit take up (one-off and ongoing) £5,600,284 of debts were written either through debt relief orders, negotiations with creditors, bankruptcy or insolvency. Over 1,500 clients had their debts re-negotiated to a manageable level allowing them to financially support themselves going forward Over £200,000 of other financial gains were achieved including accessing charitable payments for clients, resolving housing problems and negotiating with employers on behalf of clients.

£1,311,333 of increased benefit and tax credit take up (one-off and ongoing) –160 Clients received one-off payments of benefits and 274 Clients received ongoing benefit payments

£5,600,284 of debts were written off either through debt relief orders, negotiations with creditors, bankruptcy or insolvency –827 Clients received a DRO, 295 Clients were assisted with bankruptcy, 32 Clients referred for an IVA and 36 Clients had debt written off.

Over £200,000 of other financial gains were achieved including accessing charitable payments for clients, resolving housing problems and negotiating with employers on behalf of clients –29 Clients were either represented in Court or had court action averted

Over 1,500 clients had their debts re-negotiated to a manageable level allowing them to financially support themselves going forward

13 Client had bailiffs‟ action stopped 26 Clients had their rental property improved 30 Clients had their homelessness averted or prevented 24 Clients were re-housed 7 Clients had a dispute with their neighbour or landlord resolved

3 In 2013/14, the Bureau will receive over £1.2 million of funding to offer the following services:

General Help and Assisted Information Services

This service offers information and generalist advice in a wide range of topics including debt, welfare benefits, housing, employment, relationship and family, consumer, immigration and others from the four permanent offices and outreach. The service is provided by both paid advice staff and highly trained volunteers and offered via face to face drop in, telephone, e mail and appointment services.

GP Advice Project

Funded by the Clinical Commissioning group, Hull residents can access generalist advice on the full range of topics at 19 GP surgeries throughout the city. Doctors or practice nurses can refer patients for advice on many issues, e.g. debt, benefits, housing etc. Hull residents can also self refer by contacting the surgery to book an appointment. The adviser is able to signpost clients to other agencies as necessary.

Pickering and Newington Development Area (PANDA) Project

Residents of the Pickering and Newington areas can book generalist advice appointments at three different outreaches for generalist advice. The PANDA worker is also responsible for delivering training to PANDA staff to enable them to offer better help and support to Pickering and Newington residents.

Specialist Debt Advice

The Face 2 Face Project is funded by the Money Advice Service and offers specialist debt advice and casework through our team of eight debt specialists. This funding is specifically to provide free face to face debt advice to the most disadvantaged social groups.

Advice Services Transition Fund Project

The Bureau is the lead in a partnership of 13 local advice organisations focused on improving outcomes for clients by renewing service models, reducing duplication, improving quality and bringing partners together to be more effective and efficient.

An accredited training centre will be established to provide training for advice workers, advocacy and support workers and other frontline staff.

Welfare Rights Advice

4 The East Riding of Yorkshire Council has provided funding for specialist welfare rights casework. Appointments are available to East Riding residents.

Legal Advice Centre

Local Solicitors volunteer their time and expertise to the Bureau. Free appointments with a local solicitor are available between 4pm – 6pm on Wednesdays in Hull. Clients are booked an appointment after seeing an advisor at the Bureau.

Consumer Empowerment Partnership

Funded by BIS via Citizens Advice, there are 10 Partnerships across the country. Working closely with trading standards, other bureaux and local agencies the officer is responsible for raising awareness of consumer issues amongst the public and other agencies and developing information to enable people to tackle issues themselves. The Bureau is the lead for Yorkshire and Humber.

Big Energy and Financial Capability Training

The Bureau has for many years worked to enable people to manage their money more effectively through:

financial capability workshops and one to one sessions

Energy Best Deal promotions and assisted information

In 2013/14 the Bureau led on Energy Best Deal week in Yorkshire and the Humber

The Bureau is constantly seeking further funding from other sources.

5 Two case studies to highlight the impact of the Bureau’s work

Case study – Debt

Our client first presented to the Hull office, where following a triage assessment she was referred to the specialist debt team. The client had been “encouraged” to take on a mortgage of £120,000 by a Financial Adviser, despite the fact that she was on very low income and it was clearly not affordable. Repayments were unaffordable and the Mortgage Company was threatening repossession.

Our Debt Caseworker challenged the Mortgage provider, on the basis that they had failed in their duty to ensure that the credit arrangement was affordable, and the Financial Adviser on the basis that there had been undue influence on the client and mis-selling. Following a statement from CAB that a complaint would be made to the Financial Services Authority, the Mortgage Company agreed that £99,000 of the outstanding mortgage would be written-off, the balance of £21,000 could be paid at affordable repayment levels in perpetuity. The rate agreed was £5 per month due to the client’s low income levels. The Caseworker drew up the agreement for the Mortgage Company to sign.

Subsequently, the client returned to our East Riding office. The Mortgage Company had reneged on the deal and was threatening repossession again. The ER Caseworker was able to see the past case record on our integrated case recording system and discuss the background of the case with the previous caseworker.

It was agreed with the client that a complaint should be made to the Financial Ombudsman. This was communicated to the Mortgage Company, with the offer for this action to be suspended if they withdrew their claim and honoured the original agreement. Initially, the Financial Ombudsman found in favour of the Mortgage Company, stating the Mortgage Company did not intend the agreement to last “in perpetuity”. On immediate presentation of further paperwork from the CAB, within four days of the original decision, the Ombudsman changed his decision.

Case Study – Welfare Benefits Mr and Mrs B came to us for advice after they realised they had not received all of their benefits entitlement. The family had been unable to get a National Insurance number for their first child (as he was approaching 16) and were told to contact the Child Benefit office for this. However, they found out that the benefits office had an address for their son in a different part of the country (Scotland), where they had never lived. Mr & Mrs B then discovered that no payments had been made to them for child benefit for this child for many years. However, this had gone unnoticed by Mr & Mrs B, because they were getting it paid for their second child, and they had assumed the amounts were correct.

When Mr & Mrs B approached the benefits office they were told that despite the fact it was the Benefits Offices mistake, they would only be able to claim 3 months of backdated child benefit, and the couple were given a form to do this.

We then took up the case on behalf of the family, utilising our specialist welfare benefits legal advice team, and argued with the Benefits office over several months. We established evidentially that the appropriate benefits had not been paid to the correct couple for many years, and the fault was the Benefits office not the family’s. We successfully argued in law that Mr & Mrs B were entitled to a full backdate of the benefit, not just three months’ worth. By representing Mr & Mrs B in this case, we got the benefits office to concede the case and the family received over £19,000 in backdated child benefit.

However, if the family had believed the information given about backdating by the Benefits office, they would have only received £264 in total.

6

The Hull & East Riding Citizens Advice Bureau works in full support of the Hull city plan

Contributing to sustainable futures for the people, economy and environment in the City of Hull is a guiding factor in all the work that HERCAB does. Our primary activities support and underpin the priorities in the City Plan.

Access to Justice is essential to social and community cohesion by enabling people to assert their rights, understand their responsibilities and participate in the resolution of their problems. It lifts people up who are socially excluded and prevents people sliding into social exclusion. (Professor Dame Hazel Geen). This is the fundamental purpose of the Citizens Advice network. Local CABs such as ours are embedded in local communities, supported by local volunteers and trusted by the public.

97% of people have heard of the CAB and the service was Rated 1st of 22 national charities on being helpful, approachable, professional, informative, effective, reputable and accountable. (nfpSynergy Brand Attributes survey, 2010)

7

Big Lottery Improving Financial Confidence Project – “Quids In”

Hull & East Riding Citizens Advice Bureau, in partnership with other organisations, were successful in securing funding 5 years of funding (2013-2018) from the Big Lottery Fund‟s Improving Financial Confidence programme. This money has been used to establish the Hull Financial Confidence project called “Quids-in”. The aim of the programme is to help people to become more confident about managing their money.

The partner organisations are Hull City Council, Catch 22, Goodwin Development Trust, Hull & East Riding Credit Union, Sanctuary Housing, Hull College, the Illegal Money Lending Team and Shontal (a community arts project).

The stated aims of the Big Lottery Improving Financial Confidence programme are to enable social housing residents to become financially capable and feel included as a result of the support and engagement from their social landlords.

The project is also part of a wider study and projects are required to „test and learn‟. This means that data collection, analysis and evaluation are central to the success of the project. Learning what works and why is of equal importance as meeting targets.

To meet this aim projects are expected to show how they will bring about all three of the programme outcomes.

•Social housing residents have greater access to appropriate and affordable financial services and products.

•Social housing residents have increased skills and confidence to use financial products and services and will continue to apply these skills and confidence making a substantive difference.

•Social housing providers engage most in need residents to enable them to understand the relevance of financial inclusion and capability services.

„Quids In‟ must demonstrate that it meets the Big Lottery outcomes and in doing so build financial confidence and enable individuals to maintain their tenancies.

This project offers 121 budgeting work, individual and group workshops, accredited education opportunities and peer-mentoring in a community environment at outreach locations. The targeted local provision of these services means they can be easily accessed by those who may struggle to access central services, including those clients most vulnerable due to physical and mental health issues and those who may face financial or geographical exclusion.

Working with those in social housing at high risk of tenancy abandonment and eviction to manage their finances and reduce rent arrears, partnership working with other charity/voluntary sector organisations and the other services within the Hull & East Riding Citizens Advice Bureau, and offering referral for other support services as required.

8

Free workshops, education opportunities and peer-mentor support available on a range of subjects and issues around budgeting, benefit entitlement and claims processes, debt issues, choosing and managing a bank account, choosing and managing credit use, consumer issues, utility switching, water metering, making the most of supermarkets offers and deals, not being duped by marketing schemes, and on meal planning to economise in relation to food purchasing and usage.

Quids In: Contributing to the City Plan Quids In helps Hull residents make their money go further in relation to food, finance and fuel. The aim of supporting communities to support themselves with peer-mentoring and training, plus the provision of communities champions who know and understand the areas and people they work with, promotes a community cohesion which will help to safeguard the most vulnerable in our communities.

Poppy was referred to the project by her social landlord. She was a young care leaver who was identified as vulnerable and had social services involvement with her own children. Poppy was in receipt of Income Support as a single parent.

Immediately upon referral we called Poppy and she was made an appointment at her local Hub where she was met our Quids In volunteer. We began by drawing up a personal spending plan with Poppy, which enabled both to see where the issues lay and identify what action could be taken.

Poppy was paying a doorstep lender £30 per week from her benefits at the expense of her priority debts and she didn’t have a TV licence. She also didn’t have a cooker or washing machine and was planning to go to Brighthouse to get them.

We worked with Poppy over a number of weeks on a 121 basis. Through this work Poppy has become familiar with the importance of paying priority debts. She has made different financial choices and has stopped giving all her money to the doorstep lender. Poppy has now got a TV licence as she understands that she will avoid a fine which would be taken from her benefits. Poppy is now meeting with our Tenancy Support Worker to discuss her options with regards to a debt relief order.

Poppy has avoided high cost credit for her white goods and instead we applied for a cooker and washer from local charity.

Poppy was also matched with a Catch 22 mentor who visits her at home to offer on going support. She has also met with the Credit Union Banking Buddy and she has opened a Christmas Savings Account.

The Future: Poppy tells us she is much more confident with her money. She has more money each week to spend on food for the children. She is happy about saving for Christmas. Poppy is now training with Catch 22 to become a volunteer mentor to empower other young people. Her social worker reports she is much calmer. Poppy feels the future for her and the children is now much brighter.

9