- Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Thursday, 20 December 2018
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Current Status:
Answered by Aileen Campbell on 15 January 2019
To ask the Scottish Government how many financial health checks have been conducted under its Financial Health Check service, also broken down by (a) local authority and (b) citizens advice bureau.
Answer
We do not hold this information yet.
- Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Thursday, 20 December 2018
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Current Status:
Answered by Aileen Campbell on 15 January 2019
To ask the Scottish Government how many (a) members of staff and (b) volunteers it expects Citizens Advice Scotland to commit to the delivery of the Financial Health Check service.
Answer
To deliver the Financial Health Check service Citizens Advice Scotland (CAS) has employed 5.5 FTE staff:
- 1 Project Manager
- 1.5 x Co-ordinator
- 2 x Administrator
- 1 IT support
CAS has also committed additional staff support from its Senior Management Team, Communications, Marketing and Quality Assurance.
In addition, 12 telephony advisers have been employed by local Citizens Advice Bureaux (CAB) to provide the national telephony support.
We do not yet hold final information on the number of local CAB staff and volunteers providing the face to face support.
- Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Thursday, 20 December 2018
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Current Status:
Answered by Aileen Campbell on 15 January 2019
To ask the Scottish Government what the minimum level of service is for the Financial Health Check service agreed with Citizens Advice Scotland.
Answer
The Financial Health Check service is expected to provide income maximisation support for an additional 15,000 clients each year.
- Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Thursday, 20 December 2018
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Current Status:
Answered by Aileen Campbell on 15 January 2019
To ask the Scottish Government what the verified financial gain (VFG) of its Financial Health Check service is to date, and what the target VFG gain is for (a) 2018-19 and (b) 2019-20.
Answer
Client financial gain is one of the six key performance indicators for the service. Citizens Advice Scotland and Citizen Advice Bureaux record a financial gain for a client once they can confirm the client has been awarded a benefit and/or service. We do not hold information on the verified financial gain (VFG) to date. No VFG targets have been set as part of this project.
- Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Thursday, 20 December 2018
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Current Status:
Answered by Aileen Campbell on 15 January 2019
To ask the Scottish Government what procurement process was conducted for the provision of its Financial Health Check service.
Answer
The service is grant funded by £3.3 million over two years.
- Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Thursday, 20 December 2018
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Current Status:
Answered by Aileen Campbell on 15 January 2019
To ask the Scottish Government how many people have had a financial health check conducted (a) centrally by telephone and (b) locally in a citizens advice bureau.
Answer
I refer the member to the answer to question S5W-20746 on 15 January 2019. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at http://www.parliament.scot/parliamentarybusiness/28877.aspx .
- Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Thursday, 20 December 2018
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Current Status:
Answered by Aileen Campbell on 15 January 2019
To ask the Scottish Government whether the £3.3 million funding for its Financial Health Check service is performance-linked, and what the criteria are that must be met in order for funding to be released.
Answer
This is a two year project with funding for year two subject to a successful evaluation of year one.
- Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Thursday, 20 December 2018
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Current Status:
Answered by Aileen Campbell on 15 January 2019
To ask the Scottish Government what the key performance indicators are for its Financial Health Check service being delivered by Citizens Advice Scotland.
Answer
The key performance indicators are:
- Number of clients accessing the service
- Profile of clients
- Client financial gain
- Client satisfaction
- Client financial confidence
- Improved mental health as a result of the check.
- Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Wednesday, 09 January 2019
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Current Status:
Taken in the Chamber on 17 January 2019
To ask the Scottish Government what its response is to statistics stating that eligible pensioners in Motherwell and Airdrie received double the number of cold weather payments as those in Bellshill and Coatbridge in 2017-18.
Answer
Taken in the Chamber on 17 January 2019
- Asked by: Mark Griffin, MSP for Central Scotland, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Thursday, 20 December 2018
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Current Status:
Answered by Shirley-Anne Somerville on 9 January 2019
To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to question S5W-20405 by Shirley-Anne Somerville on 20 December 2018, what the manual checks in place for quality assurance require in terms of staff time per claim; what proportion of the processes are (a) automated and (b) manual, and what the staff time is per claim for manual processes.
Answer
With the commencement of Best Start Grant, all applications require that the Client Advisor verify the evidence prior to processing the application to an outcome. The information supplied within the clients application determines the verification processes and the proportion of time per application. At this time, 30% of our verification processes are automated and the other 70% is manual. We will endeavour to improve the level of automation as we iterate our systems and processes based on the feedback from users and stakeholders.