Over £24 million generated for households and long-term growth for the council: How East Riding of Yorkshire uses LIFT to support residents at every stage of their life

In late 2020, 42% of residents were living below the poverty line.

Directed by its Financial Inclusion Strategy, the council sought to increase the financial resilience of residents by targeting support to people in arrears, and encouraging the take up of unclaimed benefits, social tariffs and related support.

However, to put these plans into practice, the council needed to deliver impact without placing extra administrative pressure on staff. This was particularly important while teams were also managing demand across other council services, administering the government’s COVID-19 response grants and then delivering the Household Support Fund grants that followed.

East Riding of Yorkshire chose the Policy in Practice LIFT platform. This case study summarises the overall results from the campaigns that ran between 2020 and 2026, with a focus on emphasising the results of the most recent and highest value campaigns. It also highlights the proactive, practical work of the council’s teams in using data to identify households, contact residents and connect people to the support they were entitled to.

Councils can use Policy in Practice’s Low Income Family Tracker (LIFT) to proactively identify households who are struggling and offer them support. LIFT makes it easy to see which resident groups are best suited to different interventions, based on their household characteristics.

Offering proactive support enhances financial resilience by preventing debt and arrears. Boosting household income helps residents stay financially secure for longer, potentially reducing long term costs for the council in areas like housing and social care budgets.

Using LIFT, the council’s Revenues and Benefits team identified 43,547 households that were missing out on support. The team then turned this insight into action, launching 88 separate campaigns between 2020 and 2026 to raise awareness of available help and encourage residents to take it up.

Households were contacted by letter, email or SMS. In some wards where benefit take-up was particularly low, the team also used social media campaigns to reach more residents. The council’s Your Money team, which holds the Advice Quality Standard, contacted people in person or by telephone to offer full benefit checks and debt advice. They also helped residents set up affordable arrangements for council tax and rent arrears.

Benefit take-up campaigns were carried out to target residents at every stage of life, including early years, young people not in education, employment or training (NEET), working-age adults (25–65) and pensioners. These included:

• Healthy Start and Free School Meals campaigns
• Two NEET campaigns
• Proactive targeting of Discretionary
• Housing Payments
• Severe Disability Premium of Housing
• Benefit take up campaign
• WaterSure and social tariff take up campaign
• Pension Credit take up campaigns (repeated 15 times)

The 88 campaigns delivered between 2020 and 2026 generated £24.2 million for 19,275 residents in East Riding. This represents a return on investment of £134 for each £1 spent by the council and reflects the sustained work of teams who have used data, local knowledge and direct contact to help residents access support.

Six campaigns were launched between 2023 and 2026:

• Healthy Start: East Riding launched 4 different Healthy Start campaigns, helping over 100 households to claim over £87,000 from 2024 to 2026. 

• Free School Meals: the council launched two Free School Meals campaigns that helped to auto enrol 141 children from 2023 – 2026.

• The free school meals will save families £185,710 over the three school years
• The schools will receive £481,385 in additional Pupil Premium over the three years the campaign has run.

The results:

• The Free School Meals campaign generated £667,095 in support to families and schools.

East Riding officers launched two campaigns to help young people not in education, employment or training, and their households, maximise their income and access support that could help them move towards employment.

• Increase Benefits: 79 households were contacted with non-dependant NEETs aged 16-24. The council offered support from the in-house Your Money team.
• The Your Money team reached out to households with NEETs that were in arrears and not receiving DHP support. These households were at risk of parental eviction, particularly if the young person remained out of work over the longer term. Council officers provided support through the Your Money team, and 44 referrals were made.

The results:

• These two campaigns reduced the number of households experiencing a cash shortfall by 10.53% and lowered relative poverty by 18%.
• Households saw their monthly take-home income rise by £424 on average, driven by a combination of wages and benefits.
• In addition, these also helped the council recover £7,648 in Housing Benefits overpayments (HBOPs), and £3,548 in Rent arrears.

Universal Credit

The EROY team launched seven campaigns to get more residents to take up Universal Credit. Helping households to claim UC is critical as it is the most underclaimed benefit for working age households. Also, with many policy changes in the last six years, including the £20 uplift in 2020 – 2021, and managed migration from 2023 to 2026, households needed additional help to claim UC and get the right level of support.

From 2021 to 2026, these campaigns generated £2.4 million for the 106 residents who are now claiming Universal Credit.

Watersure autoenrolment

East Riding launched four different Watersure campaigns over two years in partnership with Yorkshire Water:

• 2024/25 – 211 Households moved to  Yorkshire Water’s social tariff  – £74,483
• 2025/26 – 233 Households moved to Yorkshire Water’s social tariff  – £91,345
• 2025/26 – 22 households moved to the Watersure tariff – £8,633

East Riding has a data sharing agreement with Yorkshire Water, allowing eligible residents to be moved automatically onto the social tariff. This auto-enrolment campaign has brought £174,461 to over 466 households to help with their water bills. The benefit of this work will continue to grow over time, as the value of the support increases with the annual uprating of water costs.

Benefit Cap campaign

The team launched two benefit cap campaigns and has another one underway which started in July 2026. After identifying 116 households in LIFT, the council wrote to them offering support from the Your Money team to review their benefit claims and explore ways to help them move off the benefit cap.

The results:

• 22 households were no longer impacted by the cap two years on. 
• 6% reduction in fuel poverty 
• 6% reduction in relative poverty
• £1,082 in rent and HBOP were paid back to the council 

Debt Advice Campaign

The council launched six debt advice campaigns, with four ongoing. Through this work, the team identified and contacted just under 900 households that may have needed advice or practical support.

They targeted many types of households: 

• under 35 in arrears
• those in multiple debts
• Council and PRS tenants
• those with APAs in place with a rent shortfall 
• pensioners, or working aged.

The council offered referrals to the Your Money team, helping households claim DHPs, reduce their debts and check whether they were receiving the benefits they were entitled to.

From 2023- 2026, they have seen 

• 30% reduction in cash shortfall
• 15% reduction in fuel poverty
• 42% reduction in food poverty
• 12% reduction in relative poverty
• £13,501 was recovered in rent arrears
• £2,137 recovered in HBOPs

Discretionary Housing Payments (DHP) Campaign

Nine DHP campaigns were set up, contacting households by letter, email or text message to invite them to apply for a DHP and reduce their arrears.

LIFT again enabled them to identify the best groups of households from 2020 – 2024, based on the trends going on at the time. They identified: 

• households in arrears
• pensioners falling into arrears 
• working aged households in rent arrears and in a crisis 
• those in financial hardship 

Using LIFT they allocated over £15,000 to 37 households and saw:

• 33% reduction in cash shortfall 
• 12% reduction in fuel poverty 
• 23% reduction in food poverty 

Emergency support

Four emergency support campaigns aimed at encouraging households in financial hardship to apply for their emergency assistance grant, HSF, or a Let’s Talk Money Session: 

• LIFT helped to identity 2,555 residents for support.
• The first campaign helped 1,496 households to apply for their grant.
• Total awarded in support through the years was over £251,067.
• The campaign helped to reduce cash shortfall by 49%, and food poverty by 42%, meaning 1 in 2 household contacts are now better able to afford their essential costs off the back of the campaign.

Warm Homes Discount

Over 9,200 households identified and contacted as missing out on Warm Homes Discount (WHD). LIFT also enabled them to prioritise which households to reach out to first by combining filters like cash shortfall, food and fuel poverty to target those who would most benefit from the additional support. Letters and emails also invited households to boost their income by finding out what additional support they could receive, and showed them ways to reduce their expenditure (which had a great impact)

• The campaign led to a 65% reduction in cash shortfall.
• Households on average were £700 better off per month by 2026.

Your Money events

• On average, the Your Money events have led to a 41% reduction in cash shortfall and a 26% reduction in food poverty.
• Recovered £11k in Rent arrears and £12k in HBOPs.
• The Withernsea event brought together over 200 residents, council teams and local partners, including Your Money, Digital Skills and Inclusion, Wheels to Work, The Shores, Hull and East Yorkshire Citizens Advice, The Smile Foundation, HEY Credit Union, local foodbanks and social supermarkets, Age UK, Alzheimer’s Society, Yorkshire Energy Doctor, Northern PowerGrid, Yorkshire Water, Healthy Homes and Adult Education.

The most recent success was the Withernsea event, where strong partnership working with Age UK and other local partners helped attract around 200 attendees. The team completed 23 benefit checks and secured £36,000 for residents.

• The Digital Skills and Inclusion Team, who had free data SIM cards, saw 64 customers.
• The Shores, which are the local VCSE, handed out 54 heated gilets (with a battery pack) to residents.
• Yorkshire Energy Doctor was able to advise residents on energy tariffs and that proved very successful.

Pension Credit

East Riding has launched 15 different Pension Credit campaigns, helping 696 households to claim over £4.2 million in Pension Credit from 2020 to 2026. 

• If each pensioner continues to claim Pension Credits for the rest of their lives, this campaign will be worth over £10.4 million.
• The campaigns also included joint working with Age UK, with residents given Age UK’s contact details so they could get further advice and support directly.

Attendance Allowance

East Riding has launched one very successful campaign which helped 220 residents to claim over £2 million in Attendance Allowance from 2024 to 2026. 

• If each pensioner continues to claim attendance allowance for the rest of their lives the campaign will be worth over £5.8 million.
• This campaign also helped to reduce fuel poverty and relative poverty by 93%.
  

Carer Campaign 

The Your Money team contacted 75 carer households to help them claim Carer’s Allowance and other available support. Increasing carers’ income can help them continue caring for longer, potentially delaying or reducing Adult Social Care costs for the council.

Our research shows that the average care package cost is £44,000, meaning that East Riding’s take up campaigns successfully delayed or reduced future care packages that would have otherwise cost £3.3 million.

Free TV Licence campaign

Officers wrote out to nearly 3,000 pensioners to let them know they were eligible for Pension Credit and the Free TV Licence via letter, SMS and emails. They launched six campaigns with further four planned. 

These campaigns have generated over £1.3 million in Pension Credit and Free TV Licence support to 162 pensioners over six years.

Severe Disability Premium (SDP) of Housing Benefit (HB) Campaign

The Your Money Team did a review of 151 benefit claims to see if households were missing out on the Severe Disability Premium of Housing Benefit. They also carried out benefit checks on claims to ensure households received all they were eligible for.

• These households were awarded over £22,000 a year, as well as one-off backdated amounts totalling £11,000.
• 10% reductions in fuel poverty and relative poverty
• 28% reduction in food poverty
  

The Pension Credit take-up campaign was repeated over the years to encourage people to apply and to capture people who became newly eligible.

The breadth of East Riding of Yorkshire Council’s campaign programme is what sets this work apart. By using LIFT alongside the expertise and persistence of its teams, the council has supported residents at every stage of life, from young families receiving Healthy Start vouchers to older residents accessing Pension Credit and Attendance Allowance.

This proactive approach has delivered a clear dual benefit. Residents have secured vital, previously unclaimed income, while the council has helped reduce pressure on emergency services and wider support services by acting earlier.

The long-term financial impact is substantial:

• Pension Credit: Projected lifetime value exceeding £10.4 million.
• Attendance Allowance: Projected lifetime value of over £5.8 million.
• Proactive Carer Support: Potential to delay formal care packages, saving an estimated £3.3 million or more.

It is also worth noting that the Return on Investment (ROI) has changed over the span of the campaigns, from £416 per £1 spent in the early years to £134 by 2026. Rather than signalling a decline in value, this reflects something positive: council teams have been effective at identifying and reaching households in need, reducing the pool of unclaimed benefits in East Riding. The reducing ROI is, in effect, another measure of continued success.

East Riding’s success demonstrates the value of combining data-led targeting with skilled, proactive council teams who understand their communities and know how to turn insight into practical support.