REC WORKPLAN 2015 RENT FIRST Andrew Moore

The Aims of this Workplan To work with Nuneaton and Bedworth Borough Council to help Tenants and Leaseholders prioritise paying rent over all other bills This is to include a publicity campaign and working with the Financial Inclusion Team (FIT), Tenancy Support Officers and the Financial Inclusion Outreach Worker

What we have done? We have undertaken training from the LEP Partners in Money Management and priority debts We have met with the Financial Inclusion Team and Officers to find out the procedure of dealing with rent arrears We have placed regular messages on Social Media and other external publicity outlets promoting the importance of paying rent We have held a specific campaign of Money Management (throughout September 2015) on Facebook in time for the return to school to further promote ‘Rent First’ We have promoted and encouraged residents to continue paying their rent during the rent free weeks to help clear their arrears

What else have we done? This year I have undertaken a Money Mentors Course (accredited to NVQ level 2 (3 credits) with the National Skills Academy Financial Services in Birmingham over 2 days with the aim of mentoring Tenants on a peer based basis in the future. This course was challenging as it was aimed at Officers within Housing, I was the only Tenant in attendance We have attended functions with the Resident Involvement Team throughout the Borough with the aim of talking to Tenants and Leaseholders about money management We have assisted with the budget planner pull out for Homing In

Here’s a few pages of our budget planner…

This is the article that me and Paul were involved in to help prepare Tenants for Universal Credit

What were the results of our Money Management campaign? We posted a different piece of information or advice on the REC’s Facebook page every day through September. The most successful posts were around information which is useful to Tenants (such as applying for free school meals for children), also more interactive links to do a ‘money makeover’ and using the ‘demotivator’ to see how much that non essential cup of coffee is costing you over the year and how much Tenants can save… The number of people who viewed the posts through the month were 1644 The number of people who engaged (clicked or viewed the link) with the links were 61

We regularly post on our Facebook to promote rent first as Tenants priority bill, especially over the festive period

Barclays money skills was just one of the information tools that we promoted for our money management campaign

The Future... Work with The Council in formulating an action that will help Tenants and Leaseholders to ‘get acclimatized’ to the new system of benefits as needed Encourage people to claim the benefits they are entitled to on a timely basis Help people to understand the changes and their responsibilities when claiming and what consequences (sanctions) mean to their income and expenditure

… and Universal Credit? Universal Credit has not yet been rolled out within Nuneaton and Bedworth, which is why the REC hasn’t done too much promotion around it just yet… However We are keeping our eyes peeled, and as soon as there are any news or developments we will be going into information overdrive to help Tenants adjust and prepare for Universal Credit in the Borough… watch this space!

Thanks for listening!!!