We offer free independent confidential expert advice to help you with your problems

We are an independent charity providing expert information and advice to the residents of Rural Cambridgeshire. Our volunteer Gateway Assessors and Advisers are trained by our own training team to the highest standards to delivery this information and advice through multiple channels including email, telephone, face to face and web chat.

Citizens Advice Rural Cambs is part of the national Citizens Advice organisation which aims to:

  • Provide the advice people need for the problems they face.
  • Influence policy makers to improve the policies and practices that affect people’s lives.

Our service is open to anyone: it is free, independent, confidential and impartial. Citizens Advice Rural Cambs exists to help those who live within rural Cambridgeshire.

CARC is your LOCAL community-based Advice Services Charity supported by the Citizens Advice national network and infrastructure. We are funded by local organisations (eg local councils) and through projects delivering LOCAL solutions. Our aim is to provide our free, expert, independent services in total confidence to help LOCAL PEOPLE with their problems.

Based Locally, our staff and volunteers have a deep understanding of both local and national issues affecting LOCAL people. They are fully trained and certified to provide expert up-to-date advice.

We know that sometimes life can seem all too much to cope with. Problems with Debt, Work, Housing, Family etc all seem to pile up and it is difficult to see a way out. It may be that there are Benefits available that people do not know about or have difficulties in applying for.

Our Dedicated, Trained, LOCAL Staff and Volunteers can help you work through all this and show you how to move forward, improving your life situations.

We are Citizens Advice Rural Cambs

Clients helped by our service in 2023/2024

0
TOTAL

This is the total of unique clients (those who have accessed our service for the first time in 12 months) helped for 2023/24.  We have also helped many more thousands of clients returning within the same year, but due to funding requirements we don’t double count them.

Financials

£0
Debts written off
£0
Income gained

Number of issues dealt with

0
TOTAL

Issues

The top five issues dealt with by Citizens Advice Rural Cambs were:

  1. Benefits &  tax credits
  2. Financial services & capability
  3. Debt
  4. Benefits Universal Credit
  5. Utilities & Communication

Activities

People access our services in different ways.  In 2023/24 this included:

Channel No of Activities *
Phone 11,363
Email 8,977
In person 2,948
Web chat / Text 310
Letter 169
* includes multiple activities per client

Other information

Further information can be found in the following linked documents:

Help to Claim – Our impact in 2019/2020

The Citizens Advice Rural Cambs Help to Claim service is part of the National Program to support people in the early stages of a Universal Credit claim, from the application, through to first payment.

A selection of case studies

Download one of the following case studies.

Some Case Studies

Client and his school-aged son moved to the local area following a long-term relationship breakdown.  The client has a mental health illness and felt he needed the support of his family, so moved in with his parents and slept on the floor with his son, as there was no spare bedroom at his parents’ home…

Client aged 66 retired, long term chronic health problems, dementia, Parkinson’s disease and mental health problems, cannot write due to shakiness and cannot use a telephone or internet, stutters when speaking and gets agitated, no available friends or relatives…

Client, 44, single, currently homeless and living in a hostel. She is not currently working due to mental ill health (diagnosed with depression and anxiety) which she receives ongoing medical support for from her GP. The client was previously in a financially abusive relationship where she took out credit for her partner…

Client, 44, single, currently homeless and living in a hostel. She is not currently working due to mental ill health (diagnosed with depression and anxiety) which she receives ongoing medical support for from her GP. The client was previously in a financially abusive relationship where she took out credit for her partner…

I wish to say a thank you for all your help when I applied for Attendance allowance. I am now receiving the full amount. Without your help, I would not have known how to apply.
Extract from letter received from client….

Client stated you had arranged a supermarket voucher to be sent to him. He stated he had enough food for next couple of days so did not want FB parcel at this time.

Client gave a lot of glowing feedback and praise for the help you gave him.

Massively grateful and insistent I pass this back to you

Email from CARC supervisor to CARC adviser following telephone feedback received from client

Hi,

I just wanted to say thank you for taking the time to help us over the past few months, I received a message today saying I have a new fridge freezer being delivered on Friday which honestly made me cry, this lock down has been extremely hard on myself and my family and without your help and support we wouldn’t of continued to get through this. We can now concentrate on replacing our washing machine with a second hand one instead of buying new parts. So from me and my family we’d like to say thank you. There needs to be more kind hearted people in the world like you.

Thanks again x

Email received from client

We are so grateful for your invaluable help and support, please convey our thanks and good wishes to your colleague.

We are well aware of the difficult funding arrangements that CABs face and hope you will accept the attached, modest donation.

Extract from letter received from client….

Good morning to you and your team

I’m just writing this email to thank you for my Tesco vouchers. They have been great fully received, and will make a massive difference to my shopping needs thank you.

And I’m so great full to you all in what are difficult times.

Email received from client

Help and Advice

Look in one of the following areas for carefully selected advice to answer our most common questions. You might be able to find an answer to your problem immediately.