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Publication date:December 2013This briefing focuses on the impact of the Bedroom Tax on citizens advice bureaux and clients in its first eight months and calls for some client groups to be exempted completely rather than helped through the short-term solution of Discretionary Housing Payments.
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CAS briefing for policy makersPublication date:December 2013This briefing was provided for a Scottish Parliament members debate on the Financial Conduct Authority’s Plans to Regulate the Payday Loan Industry. Citizens Advice Bureaux across Scotland deal with 100 cases every week regarding problems with payday loan debt. CAS have made a number of recommendations that we believe will help alleviate the biggest issues clients are seeking advice on.
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CAS responsePublication date:December 2013
CAS has responded to the Financial Services Authority consultation on consumer credit.
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Publication date:November 2013Citizens Advice Scotland carried out a year-long survey of members of the public who had used payday loans (November 2012 to 2013). This followed the introduction of a payday lenders ‘Good Practice Customer Charter’ which 90% of payday lenders signed up to and committed to stamping out bad practice. Our results, backed up by case studies seen at CAB, show that one year on, many of the problems still exist for borrowers, and the code of conduct is being ignored repeatedly.
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Publication date:November 2013In April 2013, an estimated 82,000 households in Scotland were affected by the under occupancy penalty for social housing – often referred to as the ‘bedroom tax’. These households have experienced an average reduction in housing support of around £11 per week, a loss of £53 million annually across Scotland. In the six months after the change, over 1,600 affected people sought advice on the ‘bedroom tax’ at a CAB in Scotland, and we are starting to get a picture of the social impact of the policy.
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CAS responsePublication date:October 2013
Citizens Advice Scotland has reponded to the Scottish Affairs Committte's request for written evidence on how zero hours contracts affect people in Scotland.
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CAS responsePublication date:October 2013
Citizens Advice Scotland has responded to the Business Innovation and Skills consultation on consumer protection from unfair trading regulations.
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CAS responsePublication date:October 2013
CAS has responded to the Financial Conduct Authority's consultation on how they approach achieving their objectives in regulating financial products.
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Advice trends in ScotlandPublication date:September 2013This report examines trends in the kinds of issues on which consumers in Scotland sought advice from the Citizens Advice Service in the first quarter of 2013/14.
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CAS responsePublication date:September 2013
Citizens Advice Scotland has responded to a consultation on the proposed merging of the Scottish Tribunals Service and the Scottish Court Service.
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CAS responsePublication date:September 2013
CAS has issued a response to the Competition Comission's payday lending market investigation drawing on evidence from Citizens Advice Bureaux across Scotland and callers to the Citizens Advice Consumer Helpline.
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CAS responsePublication date:September 2013
CAS has responded to the Department of Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS) consultation on its draft bill on consumer rights. In our submission we welcome the alignment of rights for goods and services while making some suggested amendments to further protect consumer in this field.
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Publication date:September 2013
Our Strategic Plan for 2018 – 23 sets out what drives our work and what we aim to achieve.
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July casesPublication date:September 2013Citizens Advice Bureaux in Scotland help hundreds of thousands of people with over half a million new issues each year. Snapshot uses evidence on these issues to act as an early warning system for government, service providers, and private sector companies, to show where policies and practices are failing or inefficient. These monthly briefings use very recent evidence and are an excellent way of spotting trends and tracing the impact of recent policy changes.
This edition is based on the advice needs of clients who approached bureaux during July 2013.
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CAS response to the 'Litchfield Review'Publication date:August 2013
CAS responds to the Fourth Independent Review of the Work Capability Assessment, part of Employment Spport Allowance. In our submission we focus on the need for effective gathering of medical evidence, on some of the adminsitrative problems seen in bureaux, and the increasing severity of the consequences of getting entitlement decisions wrong. We make a number of recommendations to improve the system.
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June casesPublication date:July 2013Citizens Advice Bureaux in Scotland help hundreds of thousands of people with over half a million new issues each year. Snapshot uses evidence on these issues to act as an early warning system for government, service providers, and private sector companies, to show where policies and practices are failing or inefficient. These monthly briefings use very recent evidence and are an excellent way of spotting trends and tracing the impact of recent policy changes.
This edition is based on the advice needs of clients who approached bureaux during June 2013.
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Publication date:July 2013This briefing was provided for a Westminster debate on the Effect Of Government Policy On Disabled People. CAB across Scotland have experienced an increase in need for advice and support due to the impact of welfare changes and benefit cuts. These have had a disproportionate impact on disabled people who are already or will be affected by a multitude of detrimental changes.
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April casesPublication date:June 2013Citizens Advice Bureaux in Scotland help hundreds of thousands of people with over half a million new issues each year. Snapshot uses evidence on these issues to act as an early warning system for government, service providers, and private sector companies, to show where policies and practices are failing or inefficient. These monthly briefings use very recent evidence and are an excellent way of spotting trends and tracing the impact of recent policy changes.
This edition is based on the advice needs of clients who approached bureaux during April 2013.
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Scottish Affairs CommitteePublication date:June 2013
The UK Government’s changes to Housing Benefit have had a significant impact on claimants in Scotland. In this briefing, we have concentrated on the developing impact of the ‘bedroom tax’.
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Publication date:May 2013
Citizens advice bureaux, and a range of other community organisations, have reported a significant rise in the number of service users who are either struggling to afford adequate food or who are experiencing a crisis where they cannot afford food at all. A range of factors are causing this trend, including falling incomes, a rise in food prices, and benefit cuts. This represents a worsening of a situation where many families were already struggling to afford adequate food. The establishment of the new food body in Scotland represents a timely opportunity to address many of the wider food-related issues that particularly affect Scotland, including food poverty, poor diet, obesity and ill health.
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Stressed About Debt? High costs of energy, food and fuel mean that many people are finding it impossible to keep up, worrying about debt or falling behind on bills. The Citizens Advice network in Scotland is here for you, with free, confidential and impartial advice in a variety of ways.