Better Together information pack: 4. How does Mencap support people to manage their money?

The Better Together pack has been split into different documents, each covering a different area of information about Mencap and our services; including how we work with the people we support, and the importance of building and maintaining strong relationships with their family and friends.

Unless stated otherwise, all sections of the information pack are applicable to England, Wales and Northern Ireland.

The information on this page follows the How does Mencap support people in a person centred way? section of the Better Together information pack.

How does Mencap support people to manage their money?

We know that people’s finances are an important part of their ability to live the life they choose. Some of the people we support have independence when it comes to their finances, whilst others may need additional support to manage them effectively. Everyone is different, so it is important to support people to manage finances in line with their needs, capacity and circumstances. 

Mencap is commissioned to provide services in a variety of ways; by people we support, families or by local authorities. The decision on whether someone needs support with their finances is usually made following a Financial Capacity Assessment ; this assessment helps us to know what support people will need, and whether Mencap needs to provide this. 

Where we are commissioned to provide support to people with their finances we will:

  • ensure that our colleagues are trained to support people with their money in the way that they need
  • confirm that the person needs support with their finances, and assess how much, or how little support they need and what that support looks like
  • discuss with the person how they would like to spend their money
  • support people to budget effectively so they are able do the things that are important to them
  • ensure that we maintain awareness of financial abuse amongst colleagues and people that we support, and that people know where to go if they have concerns. 

We take our responsibility to support people with their fi nances seriously, and have a number of policies, procedures and checks in place. You can fi nd out more about these from the managers that oversee the service. 

Talking to you about finances

It is important we support people in the best way for them, so we will discuss this with you early on to ensure you know how we will be providing support, and to agree how we can work together. 

Where we are required to provide support, we will do this with three key documents.

•    Support Me with My Money Agreement-a signed form that describes in words what support is needed.
•    Annual Spending Plan-this adds up the expected values of money (e.g. income, cash paid in, bills and purchases)
•    Personal Money record-this documents transactions as they happen to allow us to compare the Annual Spending Plan

We would arrange these documents for each ‘account’ being looked after. This could be, for example, a cash tin, a bank account or a prepaid card.
 

Safeguarding

Our safeguarding policy enables us to keep people safe from all types of abuse, including financial abuse . If you have any concerns about financial abuse, you can speak to any of the managers who have responsibility for overseeing the service, or raise a safeguarding concern yourself. See the England, Wales or Northern Ireland version of the How does Mencap keep people safe? document in the Better Together pack for further information. 

The next section of the Better Together information pack is How does Mencap support people to make their own decisions?