Publications

Citizens Advice Scotland has responded to Ofcom's consultation on proposed changes to Ofcom’s NIS Guidance focusing on Incident Reporting Thresholds for the digital infrastructure subsector.

Citizens Advice Scotland is launching the Mental Health and Money Good Practice Creditor Guidance.  We've prepared this Briefing Note to support the launch.

We are actively encouraging creditors, both public and private to adopt our Principles. These set out the minimum standards someone experiencing mental health and debt can expect from their creditor when seeking support. Our guidance provides practical examples to firms and public bodies on how to achieve these minimum standards.

Debt is often the cause and consequence of poor mental health and wellbeing. This intrinsic link between debt and mental health is well known with it estimated that 1 in 2 people in problem debt also have a mental health issue.

Managing these issues can prove extremely difficult and people can often find themselves in vicious cycles where money problems impact upon their mental health and poor mental health worsens their financial situation.

Our Citizens Advice Network routinely supports people in these situations and with the rising cost of living crisis now being felt by our debt clients and beyond, we have seen countless examples of people with mental health and money issues reaching out to creditors seeking support, only to find barriers in their way such as inaccessible processes, online only options and a lack of understanding around their mental health.

These instances highlight the vast amount of missed opportunities to disrupt that vicious cycle. We believe that creditors, both private firms and public services can do more in breaking this link.

To do this effectively, it is crucial that creditors have the tools to support people struggling with mental health issues. Our Good Practice Guidance seeks to do just that by providing tangible steps that creditors can take to make them more accessible for those dealing with mental health and money problems.

By adopting our Principles, creditors can break this vicious cycle and care for their customers at a time when support for people’s mental health and money is needed now more than ever.

CAS has responded to the Scottish Government's Consultation on Improving Scotland's Social Security.  

The cost of living crisis is squeezing household finances across the country. Across the Citizens Advice network in Scotland, we’ve seen an uptick in advice need for energy bills, debt, and food bank referrals. Since September 2021:

• Advice need for food banks has grown by almost a third (31%)
• For other charitable support, including fuel bank referrals, advice need has increased by 23%
• Advice on Budgeting Advances has increased by 25% over 2021–22
• Advice on sanctions has grown by 53% since the start of 2021-22

While one-off payments will have provided some relief to people in the short-term, the further planned energy price cap increase in October and higher energy needs in winter mean that the cost of living crisis is unlikely to end in the next few months. Long-term thinking is needed to ensure our social security system is accessible to everyone and offers the right level of support for today’s skyrocketing prices.

CAS recommends:

• An immediate uprating of Universal Credit’s basic allowance to present inflation rates and the implementation of a more responsive system to keep track with inflation.
• Further emergency targeted support for those on the lowest incomes.
• A continuous review of the adequacy of social security payments to ensure they meet everyone’s needs.
• Scrapping the benefit cap and the two-child limit.
• Ensuring any uprating of Universal Credit is extended to all legacy benefits.
• Reduce all deductions for DWP and HMRC debt to the 5% minimum until the DWP’s debt recovery process can be replaced with a revised system based on a robust holistic affordability check that better reflects people’s ability to pay, such as the Common Financial Statement.
• Writing-off historic Tax Credit debt and other historic benefit overpayment debt.
• Abolishing the five week wait by introducing a non-repayable assessment period grant at the beginning of all UC claims.
• Suspending the use of sanctions until the cost of living crisis is over.
• Automating where possible the process for claiming the State Retirement Pension and Pension Credit.
• Developing and publishing an uptake strategy for the DWP to increase claims for pension-age support.

Employment advice accounted for 4% of all advice given by the Citizens Advice network in Scotland in 2021-22. Yet while our advisers are able to offer people information about their rights at work, many struggle to enforce these rights in practice.

CAS is calling for:

• A three-pronged approach to ensuring fair work in low-paid sectors, covering:
• A preventative strand focused on awareness-raising for individuals and employers, working with schools and job centres to ensure those entering the workforce are fully informed of their rights and entitlements, and with enterprise bodies to ensure new employers understand their responsibilities.
• An easy process, anonymised if necessary, where employees, employers, and witnesses can report concerns that result in swift investigative action.
• A strong approach to enforcement when non-compliance is found, with responses guided by the severity and impact of the non-compliance.
• Adequate funding for employment support and wider advice services. › A holistic view towards supporting fair work, in particular by providing a strong social security system and other policies to tackle the rising cost of living, in order to give people the security to challenge poor working practices without facing poverty.
• A prioritisation of the Employment Bill and the introduction of a single enforcement body, adequately funded in order to effectively protect worker’s rights.

Citizens Advice Scotland (CAS) has served as Scotland’s designated consumer advocacy body for postal services for the past 8 years. From 1 April 2022, this function will be transferred to Consumer Scotland. During our time as the consumer advocate, we have made sure that the voice of Scottish postal consumers has been heard by regulators and service providers alike. Our work has been focused on making postal services accessible and affordable for all consumers, no matter where they live, or what their income level or personal characteristics may be.

This briefing highlights the key issues facing postal market consumers in Scotland today.