In September 2021, the Government announced that vulnerable households in England will be able to access the Household Support Fund. The fund provides help for households facing challenges with the cost of living. The fund has been extended to 31 March 2024.
Local authorities administer the fund on behalf of the Government to help vulnerable households access support to help with the rising costs of energy, food, water and other related essentials. The funding was allocated to Surrey County Council via the Department of Work and Pensions to help families. Surrey County Council allocated a proportion of its funding to borough and district councils in Surrey, to support their local residents within the Government guidance for the fund.
You can find out more about the Household Support fund on gov.uk and on Surrey County Council’s website.
Financial support - Surrey County Council (surreycc.gov.uk)
If you apply, we will need to process your personal data to assess whether you are eligible to receive financial support, and if so, to:
This privacy notice sets out what personal data we will use, how we will use it, and why we need to when an applicant applies for this support.
Data Controller
The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) has allocated Household Support Fund money to local authorities in England.
Waverley Borough Council is the data controller for the purposes of assessing eligibility, administering and making payments from its Household Support Fund allocation that it received from Surrey County Council.
If you are facing immediate financial difficulties, are a household living in Waverley and are struggling to pay essential household bills, you may be eligible for financial support from the Household Support Fund. Help is available on a first come, first served basis and until the funds have run out, or by the deadline dates when funds must be spent by are reached. These deadline dates are set by Surrey County Council.
The DWP requires local authorities to report on how the Household support Fund is spent using its MI Return Form. They do not require local authorities to provide any personal data. Surrey County Council completes the MI Return Form on behalf of all boroughs and districts and other organisations in Surrey that it has allocated Household Support Fund monies to. Waverley Borough Council does not provide Surrey County Council with any personal data.
Personal data we collect and process
We collect and process the personal data that you provide to us when completing your application for support from the Household Support Fund, which may include:
- Full name
- Full residential address
- Email address
- Telephone number
- How many children live in your household and their ages
- Whether any adults of pensionable age live in your household
- Whether anyone in your household is registered as disabled
- Bank account details
- Proof of any benefit entitlements eg Universal Credit, PIP, ESA
- Proof of your financial situation eg bank statement, savings account
- Copies of utility bills
- The personal details of an official person (a referee) that has agreed to support your application including their name, how you know them, their telephone number and their email address.
Source and categories of personal data
We will obtain your personal data when you submit your application to the Household Support Fund. You must seek permission from your referee to provide the details we require as part of your application. We may contact your referee to ask them to confirm your personal circumstances and that you are likely to be a household in need of support.
What we use your personal data for
We may need to carry out checks with your referee for verification purposes in validating your application. We may need to see copies of any benefit entitlements you receive or a copy of a recent bank statement to validate your application. If your application is successful and you receive a direct payment, we will ask you to provide proof that you have used the funds in accordance with the offer.
We will provide information to Surrey County Council about the number and type of awards made from the Household Support Fund. We will also report on how the Household Support Fund has been spent to Waverley Borough Councillors. This monitoring does not include any personal data.
Our lawful basis for processing the personal data
We must have a legal basis to process your personal data.
Where we use personal information to assess whether someone is eligible for support from the Household Support Fund, the lawful basis will be:
- GDPR Article 6(1)e - processing is necessary for the performance of a task carried out in the public interest or in the exercise of official authority vested in the controller.
Sometimes applicants tell us about their medical situation or provide details about their health. Whilst we do not need this to process an application, we must have a lawful basis to process (i.e store) this special category data. The lawful basis for this personal data will be:
- GDPR Article 9 (a) – Explicit consent.
We also process your data based upon GDPR Article 6 (a) – consent (see below)
International Data Transfers and Storage
We will not transfer or store your data outside the UK.
Personal data disposal and retention
We will only keep your personal data for as long as it is needed to process your application under the Household Support Fund framework:
- for payment purposes
- to provide monitoring data to Surrey County Council, and
- for audit purposes.
Therefore records relating to an award will be kept for 6 years plus the current financial year.
Further information
For information about:
- Your data rights
- Data security
- Cookies
- ICO contact details
- How to submit a subject access request
- Contact details of our Data Protection Officer
Please refer to our main privacy notice.