The fund may be able to help when you've had a sudden event or change in your circumstances, to support you if you're setting up home, or if you're facing particular pressures.
The fund may support you to resolve your immediate difficulties. It also puts you in touch with other support and services, so it's less likely to happen again.
Types of awards
There are 3 types of awards potentially available from the Derbyshire Discretionary Fund:
- Resettlement Grant
- Essential Items Grant
- Crisis Payment
Resettlement Grant
Resettlement Grants are to support an individual or family to set up home and establish a settled way of life following a period without a settled way of life.
Applications for Resettlement Grants must be made by a professional supporting the individual or family.
Applicants must be in receipt of a qualifying benefit or be likely to qualify for one of those benefits when establishing themselves in the community.
The grants are limited to one award in a rolling 12-month period. Grants will usually only consist of essential items, though other items and services may be available for people supported by Derbyshire adult or children's social care.
Essential Items Grant
Essential Items Grants can help individuals or families who are unable to provide themselves with basic household items and who are under pressure, for example, moving property due to financial reasons or to move closer for family members for support.
Applications can be made by the applicant themselves or by someone supporting them.
Applicants must be in receipt of a qualifying benefit.
Essential item grants are limited to one award within a rolling 12-month period. Only essential items can be awarded, such as a cooker, fridge-freezer, washing machine (in some circumstances), bed and bedding and a second-hand sofa. If a grant is awarded it will be delivered as items to the applicant directly.
Qualifying benefits
A Resettlement Grant or Essential Items Grant can only help people who are on one of the following benefits:
- Income Support
- Income-related Employment and Support Allowance
- New style Jobseekers' Allowance (where the household income is the same amount as that for income-based Jobseekers' Allowance)
- New style or contributory based Employment and Support Allowance (where the household income is the same amount as that for income related Employment and Support Allowance)
- Pension Credit
- Universal Credit (UC) where the applicant
- is a single person with earnings of less than £393 per month in any of the preceding 3 months
- is a couple with earnings of less than £618 per month in any of the preceding 3 months
- is a single person or couple with limited capacity for work or work related activity, with earnings of less than £795 per month in any of the preceding 3 months
- is a single person or couple with either a carer's element to their UC or in receipt of carer's allowance, with earnings of less than £795 per month in any of the preceding 3 months
- be likely to qualify for one of those benefits when establishing themselves in the community
- have been on one of these benefits within the last 3 months before making the application, and the reason they are no longer on benefit is that they have started employment
Crisis Payments
A Crisis Payment may help people when they can't pay for food or energy costs which could lead to an immediate and serious risk to the health and safety of the person or their family. This could be because there has been a sudden event or a change of circumstances. Payments can also be made for clothing in an emergency situation.
If a Crisis Payment is awarded it will be given in voucher form which can be taken to a post office.
Crisis payment awards are limited to 2 within a rolling 12-month period
Apply for a grant or cash payment
You'll need the following information to apply:
- the national insurance number (NINO) of the applicant
- details of any household members
- the type of payment being applied for
- what money and savings might be available
Apply for a Derbyshire Discretionary Fund grant
If you can't apply online, you can telephone: 01629 533399. The team will take some personal information during the call, and then an assessor will phone you back to discuss the application in more detail.
Users of British Sign Language can contact us using SignLive which uses an assistant to translate to and from BSL using a video call.
If you can't use a phone because you find it difficult to speak or hear, Relay UK uses an assistant to translate from text to speech.
We also have a telephone-based interpretation service for callers which is available in all the main languages spoken in Derbyshire. After making your application, the DDF can organise an appointment to call you back if you need someone with you to help with the call. We can also make an appointment with an interpreter.
Other things to consider
The DDF only make a payment to someone who is over 16, and who lives in Derbyshire for at least 3 months.
We can only make payments to those who can demonstrate how and why they are facing financial hardship.
We have a limited amount of money and all applications will be assessed on the basis of need, urgency and risk.
We'll seek to share information with applicants about other forms of help and support that are available, which could improve their situation further.