Financial assessment

Financial assessment

If you need social care support, ask your council's social care department for an assessment of your care needs. If you need any services, the council will also carry out a financial assessment to decide how much – if anything – you need to pay towards it.

What happens during a financial assessment

Your council will look at your income and savings and decide how much you can afford to pay towards your social care support.

If you disagree with the amount you’re asked to pay, you can ask for a review.

If you do not want a financial assessment, you can refuse one. This means you’ll have to pay the full cost of any support arranged for you.

You can ask for a reassessment of your situation at any time if your circumstances change.

Charging policies

The council may charge for providing some social care services. The social care department will give you more information on its charging policy.

No matter what organisations you get services from, they’ll tell you:

• what their service will include
• how much it’ll cost before the service begins

Financial assessment for care homes

If you’ve been assessed as needing to stay in a care home, your council will carry out a financial assessment for you.

The financial assessment will work out how much you can pay towards care home fees.

Further information

Learn about how you can arrange your own home care or employ your own home care worker with Self-directed Support.

Carers Scotland has a factsheet on getting assessments (PDF 315 KB).