Coronavirus: Helping People at a Time of Financial Crisis

The Coronavirus has plunged so many previously “financially stable” people into money crisis: loss of jobs, businesses, income, worry about paying bills.

Those already on low income with little financial resilience are in even worse a position.

Given 4 in 10 of us have less than £100 in savings, many of us are either in this situation ourselves, or we are supporting people in our parishes & communities who are.

And worry about money is very real, particularly when this situation has come out the blue, with no time for planning or saving.

We want to respond to this by offering support and training to churches and communities who are supporting people at this stressful time with money.

Capital Mass and our partners in the Black Country, Transforming Communities Together, are hosting a training session with our two “financial capability” trainers Alison Tsang and Cassius Francis.

We’re running this as 2- hour interactive webinar via Zoom.

Here is the basics of what we’ll cover:

Financial Shock: what you may be entitled to if your income has suddenly been cut; the benefit system; how to apply for Universal Credit

Financial Future: Planning and budgeting; how to start if you’ve never budgeted; how to build in uncertainty to your budget

Financial Help: Working out if you need to borrow; types of credit; where to go if you are in problem debt; the debt process

Financial Worry: how to start conversations about money; dealing with stress; talking to those you owe money to; seeking help

This session is for community and church leaders, not individuals themselves in financial crisis; it is aimed at building up your confidence & knowledge so you can help others.

We will try and cover as much as we can so this will be a whistlestop “one stop shop”, mostly signposting to useful resources already out there.

We’ll send out resource links and information afterwards too.

Please note: we’re not qualified money advisers, and so won’t be able to answer specific individual questions or offer advice; nor will this session qualify you to give out money advice if you haven’t been doing so before! We will however be happy to take questions and if we don’t know the answers, will do what we can to find out.

We’ll run the session via Zoom and a link will be sent to you the day before via email.

The next session will be on Tuesday 21 April, 7:00-9:00pm

Click here to register.

See you then we hope!

Cassius and Alison

Some of the comments that we have received at our pilot sessions so far are:

‘I attended a fabulous Zoom webinar last week organised by Alison Tsang from Capital Mass and Cassius Francis from Just Finance Black Country… Thank you both, I found it really useful and good to share information…’ Janet Mylchreest, Citizens Advice Sandwell.

‘It was great to find out the depth of knowledge and expertise that exists within the community – I left the seminar confident of how to access debt management assistance for individuals and organisations.’ Revd Ruth Lowe, Wesleyan Holiness Church.

‘In a time when everything has been turned on its head, this webinar helped me to find focus and provided all the information I needed to support those in the community who are being financially impacted by the current crisis.’ Katherine Poole, Top Church in Dudley.

‘The training was interesting, useful and relevant. I know where to signpost people and even ask them to read the websites. Thank you for resource, I’ll share it among my colleagues.…’ Selam Sagni, Church of God of Prophecy in Wolverhampton.

‘Thanks so much for the resources, I found the session very useful and you guys were super organised using Zoom.’ Gayle Webster, YMCA Black Country.

‘Brilliant to find out about all the different resources available that we can share with people in our community to support them during these difficult times. Great networking opportunity and a chance to hear what people are doing in their areas to help others.’ Katy McAllister, Black Country Click Start.

‘Thank you for today. I learnt such a lot and thoroughly enjoyed it. I am now liaising with our Principal about putting something on our website…’ Debbie Deeming, Blue Coat CE Academy in Walsall.