CLS news

Through feedback from this years Contract Compliance Audit program, the provider assurance team has put together the following guidelines to help providers with their legal help applications.

Obtaining evidence

The Unified Contract at Rule 2.4 confirms that evidence of financial eligibility must be provided to you before starting work.  However, you may assess financial eligibility without evidence if it is not practicable to obtain it at that time, e.g. cases of domestic violence, threats to abduct children, etc. 

If evidence is never obtained where it was not practicable at the outset, then you may claim a matter start (or 2 hours work if the matter is an old matter remunerated at hourly rates) providing you have acted reasonably (Rule 2.5(b)).

‘Passporting’ clients

Only clients in receipt of Income Support, Income-Based Jobseekers Allowance, Income-Based Employment & Support Allowance, Guarantee Pension Credit or NASS support are passported but the claim has to be ‘live’ and being paid during the computation period of one month prior to the legal help form being signed.

Evidence outside of the computation period

The LSC would not recommend firms to rely on evidence outside of the computation period but accepts that on rare occasions, this evidence can be accepted where it seems reasonable to do so. 

An example of this would be the most recent letter from the Department for Work and Pensions notifying a change in benefit amount. 

However, it should be noted that - with the client in attendance - the firm can telephone the relevant benefits agency to obtain details of the benefits being paid. 

A note confirming the type of benefit, the amount of benefit, name of the person spoken to, etc, would be sufficient for audit purposes.

For more information

The links below provide further information on assessing eligibility and what evidence of income is required.

CLS financial regulations - PDF (263kb)

Unified contract - PDF - (289kb)