Getting help from social services if you're homeless

Social services might be able to find you somewhere to live if you're homeless and any of the following apply:

• you're 16 or 17 years old and you don't have family you can live with

• you're responsible for a child who normally lives with you

• you're ill, disabled or have mental health needs

• you’re 18 to 25 years old and you used to live in care

If you’re 16 or 17 years old, you can ask social services for help straight away.

If you're over 18 years old, you'll usually need to ask your local council's housing department for help before trying to get help from social services. Check how to make a homeless application to the housing department.

You can ask social services for help if the housing department decides they won’t house you - this is usually because they think you’re intentionally homeless.

Find out what help you can get

Social services have to look into your situation to work out your needs and how they might be able to help you. This is known as carrying out a ‘needs assessment’.

The help you might get from social services will depend on your circumstances.

Applying for help from social services

You should call your local councils’ social services department - find your local council on GOV.UK. Explain your circumstances and ask them to assess your need or your family’s need for housing. Make sure you tell them that you’re homeless. If you have health problems explain how they affect you.

You don’t need to apply for help if you’ve been referred to social services by the council. But it’s still worth checking that they’II do a needs assessment.

Preparing for your needs assessment

Your assessment must be done in a suitable way for your circumstances and your child’s if you’ve asked for their needs to be assessed. For example, it can be done by:

• completing a form

• a telephone interview

• having a face-to-face meeting with a social worker

Get evidence of your situation or child’s if their needs are being assessed. You’II need to send the information to your local council’s social services office or take it to the assessment, if possible. You could, for example, get a letter from your doctor or support worker to explain how not getting housing will affect you and your household.

You can send evidence to your local social services office after the assessment if you can’t get it before.

Social services will usually also ask your doctor and other people who know you about your needs or your child’s, if you agree.

There’s no deadline for social services to do a needs assessment if you’re an adult, but they should give you an idea of how long it will take.

If you need an assessment for your child or you’re 16 or 17 and need one, it should be done in 45 working days of you making a request. If social services don’t meet the deadline they must explain why.  

After the assessment you’II get a written decision saying if social services can give you housing.

If the housing you’re offered is unsuitable

Explain to social services why you think it’s unsuitable and ask for alternative accommodation.

Give them any evidence to support your case, for example a letter from your doctor explaining that the property will be harmful to your health.

If social services won’t give you somewhere else to stay, you can challenge the decision.

Challenging a decision by social services

Social services must give you a clear reason for their decision.

If you disagree with their decision you can complain by following your local council's complaints procedure. Find your local council on GOV.UK.

If you’re still not happy with social services response

You can take further action by complaining to the Public Services Ombudsman. Check how to complain to the Public Services Ombudsman on their website. Social services are a type of ‘public service provider’.

You might also be able to take legal action in certain cases where making a complaint wouldn’t be appropriate. For example, if you’re a homeless 16 or 17 old and social services refused to help without good reason.

You might need to get help from a solicitor to take legal action. You might be able to get legal aid - this means you won’t have to pay for legal advice. You can find legal aid solicitors on GOV.UK. They’ll check if you’re able to get legal aid.

It’s worth looking for solicitors in the categories ‘Housing’, ‘Community care’ and ‘Public law’. You’ll need to check the websites of the law firms to see if they can help people who used to live in care, and you might need to contact them and ask them.