Reviewing Our Charter for the future

Our Charter sets out what people can expect from Social Security Scotland, how we support people to get the money they are entitled to and how they can get in touch with us to share their feedback.

When we were setting up Social Security Scotland, we wanted to put in place a clear set of core values and ensure we followed the commitments in the Social Security (Scotland) Act 2018.

We asked people with experience of using the UK benefits system and people that support them to share their expectations with us as we designed Our Charter. It defines our values, including our commitment to treat everyone with dignity, fairness and respect and recognises that social security is support that any of us could need at any time.

When we published Our Charter in 2019, we agreed to review how we were performing against our commitments every year in our Charter Measurement Framework and review the entire Charter every five years.

The Charter Measurement Framework outlines how Social Security Scotland and the Scottish Government are delivering social security and the Charter commitments, helping us to improve our service for the people of Scotland.

When we came to review Our Charter in 2024, we followed the same o-design approach to include people who had used our new service and stakeholder organisations that help or represent people who may use social security.

Changes include new commitments which outline what people can expect when they apply for a benefit and more information about how performance and feedback are used to make improvements.

We have also focused on how we support clients’ communication needs and share information about the support available to clients.

Since it was created, Our Charter has been embedded in all aspects of the social security system. When colleagues join our organisation, they receive training to understand the Charter and their responsibilities to our clients and each other.

As well as being published online, clients receive a paper copy of Our Charter alongside decision letters.

We also produced accessible formats including a video with British Sign Language, audio, large print and Easy Read.

Our Charter is available here