This campaign has now closed
Two years' cost cover for new resources to enable us to extend access to a Citizens Advice Service to those in the community who are unable to visit the Citizens Advice Bureau (CAB) in person
Categories
Beneficiaries
Situation
While 85% of the work of our CAB is done by volunteers, we still need to cover costs associated with supervision, quality control, staff training, accommodation, IT and communications. The funding that we currently have in place allows us to open the bureau to the public for just 4½ hours a day on weekdays only. We have only one client enquiry phone line and sometimes we do not have resources available to answer the phone. There is therefore a limitation on access to free advice for those who are unable to visit the bureau in person on weekdays during opening hours. With additional resources we would be able to recruit and train more volunteers, which in turn would allow us to open longer, to run an evening and/or weekend session, to open an additional telephone line, and to run outreach sessions in outlying areas of the community. The cost of providing this enhancement to our service is estimated at £50,000 per year.