Support for the people of Medway

Get Advice

If you are seeking advice, please visit us at our office or one of our Outreaches for an Initial Check, which will serve as a brief interview to triage the problem you are seeking help on. During that Initial Check, you may be given the information you need straight away, or we may arrange for you to either have a full advice interview or speak to one of our Project Workers on that same day, or a later date. Alternatively, we may recommend for you to call a specialist agency or one of the Citizens Advice specialist helplines. You can browse our self help information website at www.citizensadvice.org.uk. This has particularly helpful sections on a range of enquiry areas, so do take a look at it first to see if it helps with your issue.

Please note that we can only advise Medway residents. If you are from outside of Medway, you'll be asked to approach your correct local Citizens Advice instead. We can only provide translators and home visits as part of certain Project Worker interviews.

Please also be aware that due to the withdrawl of funding by Medway Council, we're directing all benefits & housing matters that cannot be supported by one of our specialist projects to Medway Council, as they now provide their own benefits & housing advice service.

You can access our services via the following options:

Visit the office:

The best way to reach us is by visiting our office. Our walk-in service operates from 9:00am-4:00pm Monday through Friday. There's no need to make an appointment. We're located at:

  • Third Floor, Kingsley House, 37-39 Balmoral Road, Gillingham, Kent, ME7 4PF

Outreaches:

Citizens Advice Medway operates a number of Outreaches in the local community where people can speak with one of our team. The list of Outreaches is below:

  • St Augustine's Church, 192 Rock Avenue, Gillingham, ME7 5PW - Sessions held every Wednesday from 9am-11am. (Walk-In Service)

  • St Margaret's Church, High Street, Rainham, ME8 8AN - Sessions held every Tuesday from 9am-11am. (Walk-In Service)

  • The Salvation Army, Church Street, Chatham, ME4 4BT - Sessions held every Wednesday from 10am-12:30pm. (Walk-In Service)

  • St Peter's Church, Delce Road, Rochester, ME1 2EH - Sessions held on the first and third Tuesday of every month from 10am-11:30am. (Walk-In Service)

  • St Justus Church, The Fairway, Rochester, ME1 2LT - Sessions held on the third Tuesday of every month from 10:30am-12:30pm. (Walk-In Service)

  • Twydall Library, 13-15 Twydall Green, Gillingham, ME8 6JY - Sessions held every Wednesday from 9am-12pm. (Walk-In Service)

  • HMP Cookham Wood, Sir Evelyn Road, Rochester, ME1 3LU - Sessions held on the first Tuesday of every month from 9:30am-12:30pm. (For those currently residing at HMP Cookham Wood only)

  • Luton Primary School, Luton Road, Chatham, ME4 5AW - Sessions held on the first Tuesday of every month from 9am-10am. (For parents of children attending Luton Primary School only)

Telephone:

You can call us on 01634 383 760 between 9:00am and 5:00pm Monday through Thursday and 9:00am and 4:30pm on Fridays. Local call rates do apply. Please be aware we don't offer advice on this number. 

If you're seeking telephone advice, you can call the national Citizens Advice telephone service for free at 0800 144 8848 between 9:00am and 5:00pm Monday through Friday. If you're calling from a mobile device, you will be asked to enter a landline number to help direct your call to the nearest Citizens Advice office. This can be any landline number if you don't have one.

There are also a number of specialist Citizens Advice helplines you can call:

  • You can get advice on issues relating to goods & services by calling the Citizens Advice Consumer Service for free at 0808 223 1133 between 9:00am and 5:00pm Monday through Friday.

  • You can receive help claiming Universal Credit by calling the Citizens Advice Help to Claim Service for free at 0800 144 8444 between 8:00am and 6:00pm Monday through Friday.

  • You can arrange a food parcel by calling the Citizens Advice Help Through Hardship helpline for free at 0808 208 2138 between 9:00am and 5:00pm Monday through Friday.

By email or letter:

You can email us at info@medwayadvice.org.uk. We will aim to get back to you within 5 to 10 working days.

Our postal address is:

Citizens Advice Medway
Third Floor, Kingsley House,
37-39 Balmoral Road,
Gillingham, Kent,
ME7 4PF.

You can mail us a letter in the post to the address above, and we will get back to you as soon as possible.

You can email us 24/7 using the form. We always strive to respond to every email within 5 working to 10 days. 

  • You can also access our Webchat service through the button on the right side of each webpage on this site between 10:00am and 12:00pm Monday to Wednesday.

The next step after your interview could be:

  • leaflets or a self help information pack sent to you via email or post, or contact details for other organisations that are better able to assist you.
  • an interview on either the same day or at a later date for full advice.
  • an interview on either the same day or at a later date with a Project Worker which could go beyond a one-off interview.

All information and advice we provide is quality checked, thorough and reliable. Many clients can get information from us at the Initial Check and then start to resolve the issue themselves. Other clients will need more help or the issue may be complex.

Only a proportion of our clients qualify for support from our Project Workers as the projects they are attached to can only be operated thanks to the funding of our supporters. The projects we run are:

  • Money Advice Service Debt Advice Project (MAS): A project funded by the Money Advice Service that provides Money and Debt Advice to anyone in debt.
  • Veterans First Medway: A project funded by the Veterans' Association that provides advice to people who are ex-forces needing to find and/or sustain their current accomodation.
  • Pro-Bono Solicitors: A partnership between Citizens Advice Medway and two Solicitor firms which allows us to provide free legal advice on Civil Liberties, Clinical Negligence and Criminal Law.
  • Medway Resilience: A project funded by the National Lottery Community Fund to provide benefits, debt, and housing advice as well as provide training to other professional agencies.
  • Medway Foodbank Advice Service: A project funded to support people engaging with Medway Foodbank to resolve their cause of food crisis.
  • Energy Advice Programme: A project funded by National Grid to provide energy advice to anyone experiencing or at risk of experiencing fuel poverty.
  • HMCTS Form Filling Service: A project funded by HMCTS via We Are Group to support those with limited digital skills to complete certain GOV forms.

 

If you don’t qualify for one of the above projects, then we will still offer you as much support as you need from our office, although your issue may need to be dealt with over a number of appointments. Remember – our help is free, impartial and confidential. Citizens Advice has been in the advice business for over 70 years so if we can’t help, we will know who can.

Our supporters

Our partners

Our use of cookies

We use necessary cookies to make our site work. We'd also like to set analytics cookies that help us make improvements by measuring how you use the site. These will be set only if you accept.

For more detailed information about the cookies we use, see our Cookies page. Cookie Control Link Icon


Necessary cookies

Necessary cookies enable core functionality such as security, network management, and accessibility. You may disable these by changing your browser settings, but this may affect how the website functions.