Welfare Advice

GENERALIST

Generalist Welfare, Housing, Money & Debt Advice Service

Stifford Centre, working in partnership with Bangladesh Youth Movement (BYM), and Wapping Bangladesh Association (WBA) is delivering this generalist (Social Welfare, Housing, Money & Debt) advice, with casework support, in Stepney/St, Dunstan, Whitechapel; Shadwell, Wapping and St. Katherine/Wapping wards

This project responds to the acute social need in Cluster Wards 3 & 4 (5 wards), including high rates of out-of-work benefits claims, severe housing issues/rent arrears, evictions and personal debt. The service also covers advice on current welfare reforms issues, particularly the bedroom tax and £23,000 household benefits cap.

Eligibility

Service Availability

Wapping Bangladesh Association BYM Stifford
Monday
Drop-ins
2pm to 4pm
Telephone Advice
4pm to 5pm
Evening Surgery
5pm to 6pm
Drop-ins
10am to 1pm
Tuesday Drop-ins
2pm to 4pm
Telephone Advice
4pm to 5pm
Appointments
2pm to 5pm
Drop-ins
10am to 1pm
Evening Surgery
10am to 1pm
10am to 1pm
Thursday Appointments
10am to 1pm
Drop-ins
10am to 1pm
Telephone Advice:
5pm to 7pm
Appointments
2pm to 5pm
If you need advice in the evening or weekend, you can request an appointment with our Service Lead.

Triage Service

The partners have a single system of triage across all routes of accessing the service. This includes a triage interview and diagnosis of your problem; brief advice on whether the problem is resolvable within the triage interview; plus a follow up appointment sign-posting or referral as appropriate. This also means we can refer you to other partners without you needing to request any additional appointments.

Partners

The project works closely with THCAN partners across Tower Hamlets. You can find out more about THCAN partners here. http://thcan.org.uk/

How have our clients benefitted?

Case Study 1

The client, Mr. A attended a drop in session after receiving a letter from HMRC informing him that his Tax Credit claim was refused.

Mr. A was seen by a benefits Adviser. Mr. A explained to us that his Working Tax Credit claim was last paid 3 months ago despite providing HMRC with all the requested documents. The advisor requested a reconsideration of their decision and provided HMRC with all documents relating to his employment giving a thorough explanation of his circumstances.

As a result of the reconsideration application, Mr. A’s Tax Credit claim was re-instated and he was awarded a benefit of £3365.74 which included a backdated payment of £1525.36

Some key stats:

657 enquiries attended to between 2015/16in the last year (Enquiries ranged from simple phone calls dealing with Housing Benefit matters to complicated benefit appeal hearings)
Secured £42,371 worth backdated payments through successful appeals.

Quality Charter

Stifford Centre’s advice service is accredited by Specialist Quality Mark (SQM)

http://www.sqm.uk.com/index.php
We are also a member of Advice UK.

Case Study 2

The client, Mrs. Y attended a drop in session with amended award notice dated 28/09/15 from the HMRC stating that she had been overpaid Tax Credit of £6717.13 for the period ending 23/10/14 . This overpayment resulted because of the fact that Mrs. Y’s partner moved with her on 23/03/14 but HMRC stated that she informed them several months later on 23/10/15 and hence the overpayment.

Mrs. Y informed us that she was stressed and couldn’t sleep at night. Our advisor wrote a letter to HMRC to assess Mrs Y’s overpayment under notional entitlement.

A few week later, Mrs Y received a letter from HMRC confirming that they have re-assessed the overpayment to be £6583.79 and will review the matter again under notional income entitlement. Subsequently, HMRC reduced the overpayment by £6,382.86. HMRC also agreed to recover the reminder of the overpayment of £200.93 by instalment.

Mrs Y was immensely relieved with the outcome and informed us that she felt she can move on with her life.

felt she can move on with her life.

Stifford Centre