Example
Mr C made applied to the council for a crisis grant for assistance with living costs. He had not been paid a payment of Universal Credit (UC) he was expecting to receive after his employment had ended, and had no money until his next payment of benefit.
The council refused the application on the basis that he had received three previous awards for issues relating to a gap in his income due to new claims for UC and they did not consider the circumstances to be exceptional. Mr C asked the council to review the decision but they did not change it following a first tier review.
Mr C asked the SPSO to carry out an independent review. We took into account the specific facts of the case. After speaking with the applicant and taking advice from an independent organisation, it appeared that there had been an error in the calculation of Mr C's UC payment. This was due to the reporting of Mr C's income to HMRC by his employer. We assessed that Mr C was not at fault for this and that this application differed from previous applications as it concerned an existing claim rather than a new claim. We therefore disagreed that the circumstances were not exceptional (covered in section 7.23 of the SWF guidance) but this was on the basis of new information regarding his UC which was not available to the council. We instructed the council to award £120.00 and also provided some feedback regarding the quality of the council’s written communication.