DWP Income Support, HB and CTB error review HELP!!

[milliard]

Please can anyone give me some advice or reassurance?

My wife's daughter has this morning received a letter from DWP dated 26th August that her IS has been stopped as of 7th August. This was not so unexpected as she split with her partner on that date and he moved out officially on 15th August.

What was unexpected was that when she called them to find out what to do about a new claim she was informed that she should not have been receiving any IS at all since they moved in together in July last year and they are reviewing her case. She must also make a fresh claim. The woman on the phone did admit that my stepdaughter had told the DWP at the time (she actually had assistance from some sort of family support worker to fill out the forms and has a benefit award letter stating 'Benefit paid for you and your partner' meaning they definitely did know) but she also said the DWP had made an error and she should have been denied IS altogether.

She is disabled and has 3 dependent children all under 8 and is now unexpectedly skint as she didn't realise some of the payments she had thought were being made into the bank weren't! She now has to wait for this review to happen before she receives any more IS.

To cap all that off, her recent new HB and CTB claims have also been put on hold whilst the matter is resolved, she moved into a new rental property on 16th July and still hasn't received a bean meaning she is already £1700 or so in rent arrears.

 

Questions:-

 

1. How long is this DWP review process likely to take and is there any way to push for a speedy resolution?

 

2. Is it likely she will be asked to repay this 'overpayment' by the DWP?

 

3. Is it likely she will be asked to pay back some or all of the HB and CTB that she received for the previous period when they were living together.

 

4. What is likely to happen with this new claim for HB and CTB after the DWP review is complete? Would her HB payments be affected for the new property i.e. reduced payments?

 

Many thanks in advance, worried stepdad and landlord!!!

[estellyn]

1) how long is a piece of string. Give any requested info promptly to speed things up.

 

Has the claim been suspended or ended? If it has been ended, then she needs to make a new single claim. If suspended then she'll have to wait for a decision.

 

2) If she can prove that the DWP made the error in their decision and that all the info she gave was correct then the the overpayment is not recoverable under social security law due to official error, and if the overpayment is requested to be repaid, then she she should write to the DWP stating that it is not recoverable and why.

 

3) It depends if she informed them that her partner had moved in. If not then yes.

 

4) she will be awarded HB and CTR if she's entitled (based on income or I.S. award). Yes, payments may be affected by overpayment recovery. Not up to date on what the current rates are, might be £10-15 she may need to find.

 

Are you her landlord? If so has your relationship been declared on the application?

[milliard]

Hi Estellyn, thanks for replying.

 

1. I'm not certain whether it's suspended or ended I shall find out tomorrow. I presume the latter as they want her to make a fresh single claim I believe. (does this mean she will now join those on this new Universal credit thing and get HB or its equivalent from the DWP instead BTW?) They haven't requested any info, not by letter anyway. She wouldn't even have known about it yet except for the telephone call she made to the DWP today on receipt of the letter. Is it likely days, weeks or months is the question really.

 

2. They seemed to admit as much on the phone but we shall see if they change that story and maybe lose the recording of the call!

 

3. Yes it was declared, they moved in to a rented house together last year, both names on a new tenancy at the same time as the DWP were informed of the change of circumstances.

 

4. I am worried that the Local Authority will decide that she has to repay HB and CTB anyway because it was the DWP that made the error and not them. They may say she was not entitled to it as she wasn't supposedly entitled to IS.

 

and yes I am her new landlord and my relationship as stepfather is all above board, declared and legal so thankfully I have no worries on that account.

 

Thanks again

[estellyn]

If the LA were informed of all the information and your step daughter could not reasonably have known the new award was wrong (all income, saving and household details correct on ward notice) then that overpayment would be unrecoverable too.

 

Likely to be a few weeks for the decision but could be longer, though a new claim can be decided (if the old claim is ended) pretty quickly, and often before an overpayment decision on previous claim.

 

I think UC are only taking simple single claimant claims still in the rollout areas, so she should be ok for income support.

[milliard]

Thanks for all the help, I shall come back and let you know how we get on.