Comic Relief - Managing money better - older people's programme

By James Laverty - last updated on 20 January 2012

Comic Relief have opened a new managing Money Better scheme to support older people (65+) with money issues.

Comic Relief have opened a new fund £2 million fund, Managing Money Better to support projects helping older people (aged 65+) cope with the harsh economic climate and financial exclusion and hardship.

This programme will be aimed at supporting older people (65+) to build their knowledge and skills to manage their money more effectively, ensure access to good, independent financial advice, guard against financial scams and abuse and cope better with cold homes.

Comic Relief are particularly interested in how older people can be supported to manage the extreme rising fuel and food prices. In addition, the programme aims to encourage partnerships with voluntary sector organisations and banks, building societies, credit unions, energy companies and others to recognise and respond better to the needs of older people.

Outcomes

The work will need to deliver one or more of the following outcomes for older people to:

Manage their money more effectively
Increase their income
Experience less fuel poverty
Deal better with financial distress (such as abuse, scams and so on)

In addition to meeting one or more of the outcomes listed above, Comic Relief will be assessing the extent to which applications meet the following:

Older people have been involved in the design of the proposal and will be supporting their peers who are less active
there are strategic partnership approaches with voluntary, private and public organisations and local people of all ages to meet the needs of older people
new approaches are being tested and disseminated
the most isolated older people and those who are traditionally hard to reach or live in the poorest and most deprived areas are being targeted

The minimum grant size is £10,000 and there will be two grant cycles, one in January 2012, and another in April with a two-stage application process.

The closing date for these is 13 February 2012.

If your application is chosen for further consideration, you will be invited to submit a full proposal. You will then have until the end of March to submit this.

The second cycle for this programme will open on 10 April 2012.