During December our SWF team
- responded to 63 enquiries
- made 52 decisions
- 21 community care grants
- 31 crisis grants
- upheld 12 (57% of) community care grants and 7 (23% of) crisis grants
- signposted an additional 52 applicants to other sources of assistance. 79% of these were people calling us instead of their local council in error and 17% reported difficulty contacting their local council due to the lack of a freephone number
- received six enquiries from local council liaison contacts seeking advice on the guidance.
Change to priority
As noted in last month’s update, councils received additional funding to assist in the delivery and administration of the Scottish Welfare Fund. Following this, no councils are currently on the High Most Compelling (HMC) priority rating.
By way of reminder, Section 5.10 of the guidance states
'The level of priority used should be the priority level in place at the time the decision was made unless a change has been made to the benefit of the applicant (e.g., a lower priority level is now in place). This also applies to applications at the independent review stage.’
In practice, this means that if a council was on HMC at the initial decision stage but later drops to High by the first-tier review, then items that meet the High priority criteria should be awarded. Items should be assessed against High priority, not HMC. The intention of this part of the guidance is to prevent applicants from having to restart the process if an award can be made at an earlier stage, which will reduce unnecessary reviews, minimise administrative burden, and ensure consistency.
Case studies
Insufficient enquiries made
C applied for a community care grant to replace household item affected by mould and a burst pipe in their property.
The council said that C’s circumstances did not match the qualifying criteria for a grant and declined the application.
We reviewed the council's file and spoke with C. C sent us photo evidence of mould in the property and told us an independent assessment had been carried out recommending replacement of plaster and rendering. They also informed us of ongoing heating issues and changes to their medication due to breathing difficulties, which led to x-rays and a referral for COPD assessment.
C’s housing officer told us that they were aware of C’s difficult living conditions. We assessed that C was facing exceptional pressure and therefore qualified for a grant. We changed the council’s decision and awarded the items that met high priority.
Recommendations
- We instructed the council to award a cooker, flooring for three bedrooms and a bed as these items met high priority.
Feedback for the council
- The council did not make sufficient follow-up enquiries based on the information provided on the application about the applicant’s circumstances.
- The decision letters were insufficiently personalised to the applicant.
We asked the council to provide us with confirmation that the award was made within one week.
You can find more case studies in the searchable directory on our website.