Welfare Reform Team Evaluation of European Social Fund pilot project 2014-2015

target customers, as most had been living with the LHA reforms for at least two
years.
In 2013-14, the bedroom tax and benefit cap were new reforms which created a
sense of crisis for many customers, and this helped to provide a way in for a new
team proactively reaching out to them.
There are more job vacancies in Oxford than there are people on JSA, and many
people are able to transition from job to job with only brief periods of unemployment
and without the need for support. Although we started to proactively contact new
housing benefit claimants during the project, in many cases their engagement was
fleeting or non-existent because they moved back into work independently.
It also meant that many project customers had been on benefits long term and
therefore needed intensive support to return to work.
Project customers sometimes had unrealistic expectations about the type of work
they would be able to do, and their aspirations were not always matched by their
experience, skills or qualifications – or, sometimes, by the availability of particular
types of job vacancy. For these customers, managing their expectations sometimes
proved to be a barrier to engagement and progression.
During the project we recorded a total of 288 referrals to partners and other
agencies, with many customers being offered multiple referrals for different types of
support. Fifty five participants had no recorded referral to a partner, primarily
because they found work without external referral, they did not take up a referral or
they failed to attend a referral meeting or activity.
As a result of these factors, take up of project support was much less than
anticipated, and we attracted significantly fewer project participants than we had
planned for.
Despite these difficulties, more than a quarter (27%) of project customers found
sustainable work. Customers whose employment status was known when they left
the project are shown below.
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