THE Citizens Advice Bureau has been flooded with requests for help from Islanders worried about the credit crunch.

The number of people seeking assistance has doubled since the onset of last month’s banking crisis. In the past few weeks 43 distressed Islanders have contacted the organisation about their savings, compared with just 26 the previous month. Many people wanted to know which bank was the safest and whether Jersey has a depositors’ protection scheme in place.

And according to the bureau’s manager, Francis Le Gresley, some of their clients are now blaming their independent financial advisers after losing a considerable amount of their money. Last month Mr Le Gresley said that his staff in the debt advice service saw 14 new clients, who had a total debt of £240,863 between them.

‘We have seen an increase in the number of people contacting the bureau for advice on financial matters since the start of the collapse of the banking system,’ he said. ‘The main inquiries have been about whether Jersey has a depositor protection scheme and which banks are safe to deposit savings in.’