Communities Fund has provided £80 of match funding
A Financial Lifeline for Migrant Families
Evesham, England, United Kingdom
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Aim
Free welfare, budgeting and homelessness-prevention support in their own language for Eastern European families across Worcestershire.
Who we are, and what is our project about?
Yellow Scarf CIO (registered charity no. 1190615) is Worcestershire's anchor charity for Eastern European migrants and their families — the Polish, Ukrainian, Slovak, Czech and Romanian workers who hold up the county's farms, warehouses and factories. From Church House in Evesham, community venues in Worcester and online, we provide casework, therapy and community groups in people's first languages.
This project sits squarely under the Fund's Financial Wellbeing criteria: it funds our free financial-wellbeing casework — helping people untangle Universal Credit and other welfare claims, understand and manage bills, debts and household budgets, secure the documents that unlock the right to work and rent, and act early to prevent homelessness.
Why are we crowdfunding?
When you don't understand the letters, you can't pay the bills.
Every week around 15 people reach us with the same knot of problems: a stalled Universal Credit claim, a rent letter they cannot read, a missed EU Settlement Scheme deadline that suddenly cut off their right to benefits. When paperwork goes wrong, everything unravels fast: debt, rent arrears — and in the worst cases, homelessness.
Last year our referral system received 1,470 requests for help — 54% more than the year before — and 60% arrived in the evenings or at weekends, because that is when shift-working families actually live. We are the only organisation in Worcestershire providing this support in Polish, Ukrainian and Russian as well as English.
Every case ends with a simple plan the person can follow themselves next time — we don't just fix problems, we build people's confidence and control over their own money.
How we'll spend the money raised
- £4,150 — financial-wellbeing casework hours (around 200 hours of one-to-one support)
- £450 — simple money guides in Polish, Ukrainian and English
- £400 — campaign and administration costs
£20 funds an hour of casework. £60 resolves a typical benefits problem. £250 — doubled by the Aviva Foundation to £500 — can take a family from crisis to stability. Every donation up to £250 is matched, so your support goes twice as far.
How you can help
1. Make a donation — every pledge gets us closer to our goal, and early support builds momentum.
2. Spread the word — share our project with friends, family and your network, especially across Worcestershire's Polish and Ukrainian communities.
Two-thirds of our income already comes from our own community — from people like you. Thank you for standing with us.
Funding method
Keep what you raise – this project will receive all pledges made by 13th October 2026 at 9:44am