We are lucky enough to get funding from several sources.
Those who fund specific projects set us targets to meet and this work is mostly carried out by paid caseworkers with paid admin support and some paid managerial time too. There is a need for our workers to keep abreast of current legislation too, which involves attending training courses and travel expenses. Those projects which involve home visiting have travel costs too. And there is the cost of runnning the premises, post, stationary, phones, furniture , IT support, hardware and software.
Most people who come to use are seen by one of our team of over 40 trained volunteer advice workers. These wonderful people give usover 300 hours of their time a week - the equivalent in time of 8 full time paid staff per week, saving us around £200,000 a year in salary costs. But the volunteers need to be trained to a very high standard and supported in the work they do by paid advice session supervisors, admin staff and other specialist workers. All this costs money too.
But we also raise a lot of income for the local community by identifying benefits that are not claimed, helping people manage and reschedule their debts ( including Council Tax arrears for the local authority), avoid homelessness by negotiating on rent and mortgage arrears and identifying and cliaming grants from local and nationl charities. We increase the income of our clients by several million pounds each year in this way.
None of this would be possible without the funding we get. And the more we are given, the more people we can help in this way and the more money gets spent in the local economy - so every one benefits!
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