We know that poverty is the single most significant factor affecting a person’s health, longevity, educational attainment and general life chances. Our aim is to develop and support opportunities for our residents to increase their household incomes.
This is a developing area of work for us and we are committed to working with partners and residents to develop a strategy that will make our residents less financially excluded.
Within Mercian we will:
- provide up to date benefits advice to our residents to ensure people maximise their income and avoid rent arrears
- re-train our workforce to give out basic information and provide more opportunities for residents to take up money advice – such as at tenancy sign-up and at an early stage when dealing with arrears.
Outside of Mercian we will provide access to:
- Bank Accounts
- Savings and Loan scheme
- Money Link
- National Debtline
- Credit Unions
- Home Contents Insurance
Many people, particularly those living on low income, cannot access mainstream financial products such as those above. They are more likely to use the alternative credit market and pay higher levels of interest, leading to financial and social exclusion and poverty.
The West Midlands is one of the areas across the country with significant numbers of people who do not have access to mainstream financial advice, affordable credit or banking.
In order to tackle these problems Birmingham City Council established the Financial Inclusion Partnership to tackle the problem of financial exclusion by working in partnership with key organisations such as Citizens Advice Bureau, Consumer Credit Counselling Service, Trading Standards, Job Centre Plus, Credit Unions, Housing Associations, Banks and Utilities.
The aim of the Partnership is to improve financial inclusion in the city; in particular to promote a more co-ordinated, partnership approach to debt recovery, access to financial services, prevention of problem debt and the provision of money advice. The Financial Inclusion Partnership has coordinated the delivery of four related strands of work, which together form the cornerstones of Birmingham’s Financial Inclusion strategy
To find out more, visit www.birmingham.gov.uk/financialinclusion.
Beat the Credit Crunch
Read Mercian's Beat the Credit Crunch newsletter which highlights the true cost of borrowing and provides information on accessible and affordable financial services, such as debt advice and home contents insurance.