Scottish Welfare Fund: Crisis Grants and Community Care Grants

The Scottish Welfare Fund is a grant scheme run by every council in Scotland for people on a low income who face an emergency or need help to set up or keep a home. It was established on 1 April 2013, after the Department for Work and Pensions abolished Community Care Grants and Crisis Loans from the Social Fund and transferred the money to Scottish Ministers, and it is delivered by all 32 local authorities¹. Since the scheme started, £546.8 million has been spent on awards².

There are two types of grant: Crisis Grants, which provide a safety net in a disaster or emergency, and Community Care Grants, which help people to live independently³. The fund is discretionary and budget-limited, which means councils decide case by case, prioritise applications according to need, and have a fixed amount of money to spend each year³. What marks it out from almost every other form of help with living costs is that the money is a grant, not a loan: it does not have to be paid back¹.

Scottish Welfare Fund grants do not have to be paid back

The legal basis of the scheme is unusual among forms of hardship help: the Act that created it specifies that the fund is not for the provision of loans and credit, but for grants that do not need to be paid back¹. The same point is made in the statutory guidance and in the official statistics: the fund provides grants that do not have to be repaid, and it does not provide loans⁵. That separates it from DWP products such as Universal Credit advances and Budgeting Loans, which are recovered from later benefit payments, and from commercial credit of any kind.

The grants are also intended to meet one-off needs rather than ongoing expenses⁷. A Crisis Grant might cover a fortnight with no money for food because a benefit payment has gone missing; a Community Care Grant might pay for a cooker and a bed after a period of homelessness. Neither is designed to plug a permanent gap between income and spending, and councils will look at whether the need is genuinely occasional.

Because the money is a grant, it does not create a debt to the council and cannot be recovered later, and receipt of either grant has no impact on eligibility for any other benefit¹. The scheme is discretionary, so a council can decide how much to give or whether to give anything at all, and it is budget-limited, so the amount available each year is fixed⁶. But what a council cannot do is turn the grant into something repayable.

Crisis Grants: help in an emergency or disaster

Crisis Grants exist to provide a safety net in a disaster or emergency⁸. Typical situations include a fire or flood that destroys belongings, a burglary, losing money or having it stolen, or simply having too little income that week to buy food or put the heating on⁹. Debt advice charities describe the grant in the same terms: help in an emergency situation, such as not having enough money for food or to put your heating on, for people on a low income¹¹.

The official test is about severity, not the cause of the crisis. The key test for a Crisis Grant is the severity of the applicant's situation and the likely impact on them and their family¹. A Crisis Grant can be awarded to meet expenses that have arisen as a result of an emergency or disaster in order to avoid serious damage or serious risk to the wellbeing of the applicant or their family⁹. In practice that means the council looks at what would happen to you and any children if nothing was given.

There are limits on what the grant can cover. A person should not be awarded a Crisis Grant or Community Care Grant for a range of excluded needs, and a need which occurs outside the United Kingdom is excluded¹. The fund should also not be used to meet repatriation costs associated with helping a person leave the UK and return to their home country¹². Councils are told not to use food bank referrals to fulfil a grant award: the award itself must be made to the applicant¹².

Community Care Grants: help to set up or stay in a settled home

Community Care Grants help people to establish or maintain a settled home¹. The key test is retaining or establishing a settled way of life in the community¹, and the grants are aimed at people who, without assistance, have been or may be in prison, hospital, a residential care establishment or another institution, or who are homeless or living an unsettled way of life⁵.

Situations the fund is designed for include¹³:

• leaving care or imprisonment and needing help to start a settled home
• having been homeless or living an unsettled life
• needing support to stay out of care
• caring for someone released from prison or a young offender's institution
• being under significant pressure and needing help to maintain a settled home
• escaping domestic abuse
• a child's health being at risk

Awards are normally provided in the form of goods such as cookers, beds, furniture and removal costs, rather than as a cash payment¹. That reflects the purpose: the grant is for the things a household needs to make a home work, not for day-to-day living costs, which is what a Crisis Grant covers.

People still in accommodation that provides care, including prison or hospital, should be permitted to apply up to twelve weeks before they are discharged¹. Councils are given specific instructions about people leaving prison: applications should not be rejected on the basis that the applicant does not have an address, decisions in principle should be considered where possible, and decision notices should be sent to the single point of contact in the prison so awards are timely and accessible¹². Where an award has been made for temporary release within the past 28 days and a further application is received for a different period, that counts as a relevant change in circumstances¹².

Applicants may make an application for a Crisis Grant and a Community Care Grant at the same time if their circumstances make this necessary, for example a person who has left home because of violence and needs both immediate support and longer-term help to set up home¹².

Who can apply: age, residence and immigration status

The basic conditions are the same for both grants. Applicants must be aged 16 or over, on a low income, and resident in the council's area, about to become resident there, or homeless¹⁰. No fund application may be made by or on behalf of a person aged less than 16¹².

On income, the guidance is deliberately broad. It is not a requirement to be in receipt of an income-related benefit to be eligible for assistance from the fund⁹. However, if the applicant is applying for, in receipt of, or entitled to one of the following income-related benefits, the low income condition can be considered as having been satisfied: Universal Credit, income-based Jobseeker's Allowance, income support, income-related Employment and Support Allowance, or State Pension Credit⁴. People on low wages or with a pending benefit claim can still apply; the council will assess their income directly. An applicant without a regular income who has capital assets of over £16,000 will be expected to raise money against those assets⁴.

The only residence requirement is that a person is resident in a local authority area, is about to become resident, or is homeless; there is no requirement to be habitually resident in the UK¹. Applicants do not need to have a National Insurance number to be eligible¹². On immigration status, the rule is narrow: no award should be made to a person with no recourse to public funds (NRPF), because making a grant to such a person can affect their legal status, but only people who have an NRPF condition attached to their leave should be refused on the grounds of their immigration status¹.

Two further points protect access. Applicants subject to a suspension, disallowance or sanction by the DWP can apply for Crisis Grants and Community Care Grants in the same way as any other applicant, and the reason for the sanction should not be considered¹. And a council should not refuse a grant because the applicant owes it money: grants should not be refused on the basis of outstanding debts to the local authority, such as Council Tax arrears or unpaid parking tickets, and any grant made should not be used to pay outstanding debt to a local authority¹².

Savings limits: £700 below pension age, £1,200 above

The savings and capital test applies to Community Care Grants only. The council checks that the applicant or their partner does not have savings or capital that excludes them from a grant: over £700 if they are below pension age, and over £1,200 if the applicant is above pension age¹. Independent advice sources describe the same thresholds: you must usually have less than £700 in savings to get a Community Care Grant if you are under pension age, and less than £1,200 if you are over pension age¹³, and your chances of getting a grant are reduced if you have savings above those levels¹⁴.

Not everything in the bank counts. Payments made for arrears of, or compensation for late payment of, social security benefits are disregarded as capital for a period of up to 12 months¹. That matters for people who have just received a lump sum of backdated benefits, for example after a mandatory reconsideration or an appeal: the arrears do not immediately push them over the limit.

For Crisis Grants the check works differently. There is no fixed savings threshold; instead the council checks whether the applicant or their partner has savings, capital or some other source of help that would meet the need¹². A person with modest savings can still get a Crisis Grant if using those savings would leave them unable to cover the emergency, while the same savings would rule out a Community Care Grant outright if above the limit.

How much a Crisis Grant pays and how it is paid

There is no fixed award amount. There should be no minimum amount for a Crisis Grant⁴, and the size of any award is a matter for the council's discretion, weighed against the severity of the situation and the fixed budget¹. What the guidance does is set out how a council should work out a typical award.

The starting point is the length of the gap in income. Where a crisis results from a gap in income of unknown duration, for example while awaiting DWP action, an award should usually be made for two weeks of living expenses at a time⁹. If an applicant on Universal Credit applies for living costs and it is known that their next payment date is more than two weeks away, a decision maker can make an award to cover a longer period, for example four weeks⁹.

The rates used to calculate living expenses are tied to Universal Credit measures, pro-rated for the number of days covered. For applicants liable for rent, a mortgage or primary household bills, or those without accommodation, the food and non-alcoholic drinks plus electricity and gas rates of the UC Essentials Guarantee are used; for non-householders, the food and non-alcoholic drinks rate alone is used⁹. For each dependent child, the guidance rate is the full Universal Credit child rate (the born pre-2017 rate) on a pro-rata basis for the number of days until the next benefit payment is due⁹. A dependent child may include an unborn child once the pregnancy has advanced to 24 weeks⁹.

On how it is paid, the Regulations require Crisis Grants to be provided by way of a payment to the applicant, in cash or cash equivalent, unless the local authority considers it would be of advantage to the applicant for the grant to be provided in a different manner¹. Travel awards are also possible, for example to get to a place of safety, and any travel awards count towards the three grants in a 12 month period; awards should be for the standard rate of public transport¹.

How to apply through your local council

Applications are made to your local council, not to the Scottish Government or to Social Security Scotland. The council manages the fund and makes the decisions, applying national guidance⁸, and the route in is the mygov.scot website, which directs you to your own council's application process⁸. Councils must make provision for applications to be taken via three delivery channels, for example online, on the phone and face-to-face⁶, so nobody is excluded by not having internet access.

If a person from outside a council's area seeks to make an application, the council can refer them to their home local authority, unless the circumstances dictate otherwise, for example where the payment needs to be collected in person and the travel distance or lack of means makes that impossible¹². This is why the residence rule matters in practice: you apply where you live or are about to live, and a homeless person can apply to any council.

The application itself goes through staged checks. The council verifies age, identity and residence, looks at excluded items, assesses income, applies the savings rules, and checks previous applications¹². For Crisis Grants it also checks whether the applicant is being considered for a DWP Hardship Payment, has an application pending for a Short-Term Benefit Advance, or is eligible for a Universal Credit advance, because those DWP schemes cover similar ground¹². You can read more about those alternatives in advances and Budgeting Loans, and about the main benefit in Universal Credit.

Decision times: next working day or 15 working days

The two grants run on very different clocks. For a Crisis Grant, the decision should be made no later than the end of the next working day after all the information allowing a decision has been received⁴. For a Community Care Grant, applicants should receive a decision within 15 working days after the local authority has received all the information it needs¹. Independent guidance describes the same targets: most councils tell you the outcome of a Crisis Grant application within 2 working days, and within 15 working days for a Community Care Grant¹⁵, and people waiting for a first Universal Credit payment are told to expect a Crisis Grant result within about 2 working days, though timing varies by council¹⁶.

A working day is defined as between 9.00 am and 4.45 pm, and does not include weekends or bank and public holidays. An application received after 4.45 pm is treated as received on the next working day¹.

The written decision must specify the means by which, and the timescales within which, the applicant may ask for the decision to be reviewed¹², so the letter or message you receive should tell you what happens next and by when.

Limits on repeat awards and when the budget runs low

Crisis Grants are capped by frequency, not by amount. The number of awards any person can receive should normally be limited to three in any rolling 12 month period, across all local authorities, so moving council does not reset the count⁹. Where a person is part of a couple, each partner can receive three grants in a 12 month rolling period⁹. The Regulations do allow councils to use their discretion to allow more than three awards in exceptional circumstances⁹.

There is also a repeat-application rule. A local authority does not need to consider an application if a person has applied for a Community Care Grant or a Crisis Grant for the same items or services within the last 28 days, where a decision has already been made and there has not been a relevant change of circumstances³. If the reason for the repeat application is that the previous award was insufficient for the person's needs, the review process is likely to be a more effective route than a new application, where there has been no change in circumstances¹².

The fund is a budget-limited scheme: there is only so much money available each year, so councils have to manage expenditure¹. The available budget for awards in 2023-24 was £38.7 million¹⁷, and the Scottish Government maintained funding of £33 million a year from 2015-16 to 2019-20³. Demand does not spread evenly: at the end of December 2025, if spending had continued at the rate seen to that point, 15 local authorities were heading for a combined £6.5 million overspend by year end, while the other 17 were heading for a £6.3 million underspend¹⁸.

When a council's fund is at risk of running out before the end of the financial year, it may make use of a "high most compelling" priority rating, after undertaking any required impact assessments, and it must notify the Scottish Government Social Security Directorate and the Scottish Public Services Ombudsman when it does so. Where the rating is adopted before Quarter 4, the council should set out the reasons and the evidence used¹⁹. In practice, a tighter priority rating means some applications that would have been paid earlier in the year are refused, and that is a policy decision which cannot be reviewed¹².

Awards can also lapse if they are not used. A Crisis Grant award should be withdrawn if it is not collected, or there is no contact from the applicant, within normally 7 days of the grant notification being issued; in those circumstances it would not count as one of the person's three awards in 12 months. A Community Care Grant should be withdrawn after 28 days without collection or contact. Exceptions may apply, for example if there has been a period in hospital, and councils should treat potential exceptional circumstances case by case, including making follow-up contact¹.

Challenging a decision: council review and the Ombudsman

If you are refused a grant, or given less than you applied for, the first step is to ask the council to review the decision²⁰. An applicant should request this within 20 working days of being notified of the decision, and the request should be made in writing¹. The Regulations allow a local authority to accept a review request made after 20 working days where it considers there are good reasons for doing so¹.

The review, called a first tier review, must be undertaken by a decision maker who was not involved in making the original decision¹. Two protections apply during it. First, a review by the local authority may not result in assistance already awarded being reduced or withdrawn¹, so asking for a review cannot leave you worse off. Second, the review decision must be in writing and must include an explanation of the decision and information about how to request an independent review by the Scottish Public Services Ombudsman (SPSO)¹.

The target times for reviews mirror the decision times: the end of the second working day for Crisis Grant reviews, and 15 working days for Community Care Grant reviews³. For a Community Care Grant, the maximum processing time for a first tier review should be no later than the end of the fifteenth working day after the request was received¹.

If you are still unhappy after the review, you can ask the SPSO to carry out an independent review¹. The Ombudsman may require local authorities to supply or produce information or documents considered necessary for conducting the review¹². If the SPSO finds the council has done something wrong, it can make recommendations that it would expect the council to follow²¹.

One limit is worth knowing in advance: review cannot be sought for policy decisions, such as the level of priority a council has set for awards in that period¹². So a review can examine whether the right facts were applied to your case, but not the council's overall spending choices. For help at any stage, MoneyHelper and local advice services can check what you are entitled to, and the general route for challenging benefit decisions is covered in challenging a decision.