The people with incomes lower than the average monthly income multiplied by 1.6 can submit applications to receive cold-month allowances for November – March. Applications can be filed at any time during the year, but, if these are submitted later than November, cold-month allowances for November won’t be provided, IPN reports.

The Ministry of Labor, Social Protection and Family said the financial support for the cold period of the year is complementary to the social benefit that is paid monthly for the period between November and March. Now it is 250 lei. For 2015, the minimum monthly guaranteed income for social benefit is 765 lei, while for cold-month allowances is 1,224 lei.

The application is filed exclusively to the social worker of the mayor’s office. It is valid for a period of 12 months, but should be submitted before November so as to start to receive assistance from this month. For example, if the application is filed in January, the financial support is provided since January and is unavailable for the previous months.

In November 2014 – March 2015, cold-month allowances were paid to over 130,000 socially deprived families, which is over 360,000 people. More than 90% of these families included recipients of pensions or other types of social welfare, while over 50% were families with children.