What we learn from helping people makes policy better
Our work makes a difference to people’s lives — come join us
Millions of people use Citizens Advice to find a way forward with their problems. Even more have a friend, a family member, or a colleague who has used our service to do so.
But our work doesn’t stop at advice. At Citizens Advice we do two things: we help people to resolve their problems, and we use the insights from this work to solve the underlying causes in policy.
So what, in practice, does that second part mean?
A day in the life of the policy and advocacy team
In the policy and advocacy teams at Citizens Advice, our job is to understand the issues people are facing, and influence stakeholders — like government, regulators or businesses — to improve their policies and practice. This makes change happen.
I joined Citizens Advice last year. I’m a principal policy manager, and my team focuses on energy regulation. Our work is fascinating and diverse. Recently, we’ve researched the impact on consumers of new smart tariffs, where the cost of energy can change according to when it’s used. We’ve scrutinised the regulation and performance of energy networks. We’ve represented energy consumers’ interests in negotiations with government, regulators and industry.
Across our wider policy and advocacy team, a typical day working could involve:
Analysing our own data — and insights from our network
This could be discovering a trend through our real time quantitative data, or looking at qualitative evidence from the front line to understand where a policy is failing. We speak to staff and volunteers at local Citizens Advice and draw on the insights they’ve gained from helping people.
Spotting how problems interact or resurface in different areas
In people’s daily lives, many problems are interconnected. So, we might use our evidence to see how shocks to welfare, work, or income all impact on one another and add to income insecurity.
Being in constant contact with stakeholders to provide insight and exert influence
We meet with government, regulators, and service providers directly to provide valuable insight to them and influence their thinking. This could be about the loyalty penalty for example — where we used our evidence on mortgages, broadband and energy to help make sure consumer markets don’t take advantage of people’s behaviour.
Raising public awareness and pushing for changes
Our work has high impact and we often secure great media coverage. Working with our outstanding news team, a press release or a high profile splash helps us to raise public awareness and push for changes where sharp practice exists. For example, our campaign helped regulators to introduce a cap on expensive tariffs for consumers with prepayment meters.
We add value across UK public policy
A Citizens Advice perspective adds value to the policy debate across all sorts of issues. For example:
- We think companies shouldn’t take advantage of people’s behaviour. In our work on consumer issues, we have been exposing problems with the loyalty penalty and making it easier for consumers to get compensation for poor services. We think there is a massive opportunity to make markets work better for people, from subscription traps to the private rental sector. By looking across multiple consumer markets at the same time, we’re shaping what that looks like.
- We are the official consumer watchdog in the energy market. We combine a fierce independence to fight for consumers with technical expertise to have significant impact. This means we do work you might not expect: from our groundbreaking work on energy networks where we think consumers overpay by billions of pounds, to the networks’ social obligations, and how we move to smarter energy.
- Postal services are undergoing significant change, and as the statutory consumer watchdog, we’ve seen it happen. Consumers are posting letters less frequently, but at the same time parcel delivery for online shopping is booming. More people are relying on post offices as other physical services shut down. Our work ranges from tackling mail scams and tracking new competition in post offices, to investigating whether postal services are meeting the needs of disabled consumers and ensuring that mail redirection services work for consumers.
- We’ve found that job and income security is as important as the level of pay. That’s why we are looking at the modern employment landscape and working to make sure everyone has the security they need. From sharp practice in the gig economy, to how jobs can deliver for flexible workers, we think these problems can be solved. That’s why we’ve put forward concrete recommendations on what the government can do and called for action right now.
Our clients and consumers face a wide range of issues and we’re looking for talented and passionate people to join us and help us achieve change for our clients.
Come work with us if you want to make a difference
We welcome people with a background in government, public affairs, the private sector, charities, or academia, and want to hear from you if you’re just starting out or more senior.
“I’m hooked”, writes James Plunkett, our Director of Policy & Advocacy. “I’ve never worked anywhere with a more persuasive purpose and a clearer sense that, every day, we make a difference to people’s lives.”
