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Low Income Family Tracker (LIFT)

LIFT campaign mailing

You may have received a letter from Peterborough City Council about accessing benefits and support you may be entitled to. We are using a government-approved data tool called Low Income Family Tracker (LIFT) to identify and contact households who may be missing out on financial support.

We aim to help residents receive the benefits and support they are entitled to. Many people who qualify for benefits do not realise they can claim them. 

Current campaign

  • 'You may be missing out on support as an unpaid carer' Letters sent out week commencing 1 June 2026.

If you are unsure about any other letters you have received, please contact the council by calling 01733 747474. Our team will be happy to confirm whether the letter is genuine.

What is the LIFT tool?

The Low Income Family Tracker (LIFT) is a secure data tool developed by the organisation, Policy in Practice. It brings together information from council and government systems to help councils identify households who may:

  • be eligible for benefits they are not claiming
  • be at risk of financial hardship
  • benefit from additional support or advice

The tool is used by many local authorities across the UK to help improve benefit take-up and support residents earlier. Importantly:

  • LIFT does not give the council access to your bank account
  • It does not change your benefits
  • It is only used to identify residents who may benefit from advice or support

Why is the council contacting me?

Many households miss out on benefits they are entitled to each year. By helping residents claim the support available to them, this campaign aims to:

  • increase household income
  • reduce financial stress
  • improve health and wellbeing
  • ensure residents receive the support they deserve.

Research shows that many households miss out on benefits even though they are entitled to them. This can increase your weekly income and may also help you access additional support depending on your circumstances and benefits claimed.

By writing to residents who may be eligible, the council hopes to help people check their entitlement and avoid missing out on support.

Your data and privacy

The council uses the LIFT tool in line with UK data protection law and council privacy policies. Data is used only to:

  • identify households who may benefit from support
  • improve access to benefits and financial advice
  • help prevent residents from falling into financial hardship

Personal data is handled securely and is not shared with commercial organisations. Please see our full privacy notice below.

Privacy Notice - Low-Income Family Tracker (LIFT) 

Last updated: December 2025

1. Overview

The council is bringing together information we already hold to help us identify households who may be missing out on financial support or at risk of financial hardship, fuel poverty or homelessness. We also want to help to target early help and advice for households facing housing insecurity, reduce duplication across the council and plan better services. To do this, we will use information such as housing benefit, council tax support, and discretionary housing payments.

We are committed to being transparent about how we use personal information in line with data protection legislation. This notice explains how we will your personal information to improve services and support our residents who may be experiencing financial hardship.

The council is using a secure system called the Low-Income Family Tracker or LIFT. The platform is provided by Policy in Practice Ltd, which acts as our data processor under a contractual Data Processing Agreement and certified to ISO 27001 and Cyber Essentials Plus standards. They operate only under our strict instructions and do not use the personal data for any other reasons:

  1. Only trained council officers will use the system to contact residents.]
  2. LIFT does not make decisions automatically about you. It highlights potential need so that we can review and, where appropriate, contact you to offer information or support.
  3. We will also offer the use of a Better Off Calculator on our website so that residents can see what support they could apply for. This calculator will not store any of your personal information.

The Council securely provides LIFT with information that is already held in its own systems, such as:

  • Housing Benefit and Council Tax Support data
  • Discretionary Housing Payment awards
  • Council Tax arrears and support flags
  • Address, postcode, household composition and demographic indicators (where available)
  • DWP and HMRC data regarding Universal Credit eligibility and uptake

Special-category information (e.g. health, ethnicity) is only included where this is already part of a relevant council record and necessary for the stated purpose. This includes:

  • Council Tax Severe Mental Impairment (SMI) discount indicator
  • HB/SHBE disability-related premiums/markers (e.g., disability/severe disability premium; inferences from PIP/DLA/AA receipt)
  • Adult Social Care charging hardship / Disability Related Expenditure (DRE) flags (minimised)
  • H-CLIC support-need flags (e.g., health, disability, mental health, domestic abuse)
  • Carer indicators revealing another person’s health condition

As we develop our approach then we may add other data sets to this list and will update this privacy notice. We may use other non personal information to help us identify the challenges households face such as energy performance or council tax banding.

Under data protection legislation, we have to identify a lawful basis for processing personal data and special category data.

Purpose

Lawful Basis

Carrying out public duties to prevent poverty, homelessness and financial hardship

Article 6(1)(e) – processing is necessary for the performance of a task carried out in the public interest or in the exercise of official authority

Where special-category data (e.g. health, disability) are processed

Article 9(2)(g) – processing is necessary for reasons of substantial public interest, supported by Schedule 1, Part 2, Paragraph 6 (statutory and government purposes) of the Data Protection Act 2018

This means we use LIFT as part of our public task to support residents’ welfare and deliver statutory social-protection functions. The council has statutory duties under the Care Act 2014 s2 (prevention duty) for early-help/financial wellbeing; the Housing Act 1996 / Homelessness Reduction Act 2017 (assessments, prevention and relief duties).

Access to LIFT is strictly limited to authorised Council officers working in:

  • Shared Transactional Services (system management)
  • Business Intelligence and Public Health (aggregated, anonymised data only)

All users complete mandatory data-protection training.

  • Data is transferred from the council to the system using secure means via encrypted channels and stored in secure UK-based cloud environments (AWS UK Region).
  • LIFT does not allow public access or open publication of identifiable data.
  • Resident-level information is retained in the system for no longer than 24 months, after which it is deleted or anonymised.

If analysis suggests you might be entitled to extra support (for example, benefits, energy-efficiency grants or debt advice), the Council may contact you by letter or email.

All communication will:

  • Only come directly from Peterborough City Council, not from Policy in Practice or any third party.
  • Clearly explain why we are contacting you and how we obtained your information.
  • Provide contact details for advice or to exercise your data-protection rights.

You will never be asked to provide bank details or make payments as part of a LIFT contact.

You have rights under Data Protection and these are stated on our Data Protection Rights page.

The request will be submitted to the Data Protection Officer and the Information Governance Service. There are reasons why we may not be able to agree to your request, but we will explain why and always look to see how we can help you.

If you are unhappy about how your information has been collected, used or stored then you can complain to:

The Data Protection Officer for Peterborough City Council is shown below:

Ben Stevenson
Peterborough City Council
Town Hall
Bridge Street
Peterborough
PE1 1HG
dataprotection@peterborough.gov.uk

The Information Commissioner’s Office is the UK's independent body set up to uphold information rights. Their role is to uphold information rights in the public interest. They can be contacted as below:

The Information Commissioner’s Office
Wycliffe House
Water Lane
Wilmslow
Cheshire
SK9 5AF
Tel: 01625 545700
http://www.ico.org.uk

We review this privacy notice annually or whenever there are significant changes to how we use the LIFT platform.

Any updates will appear on this webpage with a new “last updated” date.

Last updated: 03 June 2026
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