Residents to get help from Dudley Council with cost of living next week
Borough residents will be able to apply for a one-off payment of £200 from Dudley Council next week to help with living costs.
Applications through the Household Support Fund (HSF) will open online at 12 noon on Wednesday January 22, with payments allocated on a first come first served basis.
Residents can only apply if they live within Dudley borough, have less than £2,000 in household savings and have a household income of less than £40,000, or £30,000 for a single occupancy household. Applicants must also have not received a payment through HSF since April 1 last year.
It is anticipated due to high demand the scheme may close very quickly once the funding limit has been reached.
Payments will be made subject to eligibility and availability. Further information is available online. Applications will take approximately two to four weeks to process.
The government announced in September that Dudley Council would receive £2.6m in the latest round of funding, allocated by the Department for Work and Pensions.
As in previous rounds, the majority of the money is to be distributed through key council services and organisations within the voluntary sector. It is used to provide support to households experiencing financial hardship or crisis, who would otherwise struggle to buy food, pay essential utility bills, or meet other essential living or housing costs.
Councillor James Clinton, cabinet member for public health and wellbeing, said:
“We’ve already distributed millions of pounds to those who are the most vulnerable through previous rounds of the household support fund.
“We are pleased to again be able to offer one-off payments of up to £200 through our online application process to help people with the cost-of-living increases.
“It’s important to state that our Household Support Fund applications process only represents a small amount – around 15 per cent – of where the Household Support Fund goes.
“The great majority of the fund helps people in most need, via frontline services.
“Furthermore, the allocation of the Household Support Fund is just part of the work we are doing to help ease the burden of increasing costs.”
People can find more information about Household Support Fund at https://www.dudley.gov.uk/household-support-fund/
Further cost of living support can be found at https://www.dudley.gov.uk/council-community/cost-of-living/