Charging for Social Services

To receive non-residential social services (such as home care or day care) a person must be assessed by their local council. This is to see if their care needs meet the council’s local eligibility criteria for services. If they meet this, services can then be provided by the council itself or arranged by the council through an independent provider of services.

New legislation (the Social Care Charges (Wales) Measure 2010) gives local councils a discretionary power to charge for these services.

Councils can set charges at what they see as reasonable levels. To introduce consistency in the way councils use this discretion, and to provide financial safeguards for those on low incomes, the Welsh Government have made regulations as part of the measure.

As a result where councils decide to charge adults for their non-residential social services certain arrangements must occur. These include:

• councils must issue an invitation for a means assessment (a financial assessment) to those receiving services for the first time where it plans to make a charge. They must also issue an invitation to existing service users where it plans to alter a charge as a result of a change in the service they receive or in their finances;
• councils must undertake this assessment where service users request one and provide the information needed to do this;
• councils cannot charge for particular services. This includes transport to attend a day service, where attending this and transport to it are included in the agreed services to be provided;
• councils also cannot charge for providing information about their services or the charges they set for these. In addition, they cannot charge for undertaking assessments of care needs or means assessments;
• in setting charges councils must allow service users to keep at least the amount of their Income Support, Employment and Support Allowance or Pension Credit Guarantee Credit plus 35% of that amount. They must also allow service users to keep a further 10% as a contribution towards their daily living costs which may be higher as a result of a disability or medical condition;
• councils must not take into account any money earned by a service user;
• councils cannot set charges that are more than £50 per week for all of the services a service user receives (except where they charge a flat rate for a service such as meals);
• councils must operate a scheme where service users can ask for charges set to be reviewed.

These all became effective from 11 April 2011.