Hello, hope someone can help me.
One of our residents was paid JSA from June to November last year & then a training payment administered by Job Centre from November to March this year. He claimed & was awarded HB for the whole of this period based on the above as his income. A decision has now been made that HB for the whole of this period is to be recovered.

The reason given is that his JSA claim was made defective and, because he therefore had no entitlement to JSA, he also has no entitlement to HB. The local BDC told me that the JSA will not be recovered as it was an official error & they have sent the resident a letter confirming this. I am still trying to get information on whether the training payment will be treated in the same way.

I will be helping our resident to appeal and would appreciate your thoughts and advice.

Thanks.

Tue 14-Jul-09 11:04 AM by Kevin D

IF (the if is emphasised) the LA has ended HB/CTB purely on the grounds that entitlement to JSA has ended, the LA cannot make an assumption that there will be no entitlement to HB/CTB in those circumstances (para 22; CH/3736/2006).

Where there has been a change in circs and more info is needed, the LA is supposed to make enquiries BEFORE it ends benefit, not end benefit and THEN ask for info (see CH/0360/2006).

If the LA has indeed failed to follow the correct course of action, appeal on those grounds and, in any case, provide full details of all income / capital that is required for the LA to assess actual entitlement.

Hobby horse time....(a personal whinge). Time and time again, far too many LAs make "decisions" which flagrantly disregard the process that is supposed to be undertaken. I would urge any WROs and similar to pay much close attention to the processes purportedly undertaken by LAs and, where such processes fall short, challenge them hard.

Nothing much to add to what Kevin has already said, but make sure you do a written submission, and make it as thorough as you can.

You will be able to keep on re-using it and your challenges to LA's bad practices will become easier as time passes

And presumably, if the LA does get it's procedures sorted out and if it transpires there would have been no (or less) entitlement to HB, the overpayment was still caused by official (DWP) error (CH/943/2003) and would only be recoverable if the claimant should have known they were being overpaid. Presumably this would be unlikely if they thought JSA was being correctly paid.

Thanks for everybody's help.
I am initially going to write to the LA to see if they will change their decision without it going to appeal. I will use Kevin's argument that they cannot end HB just on the grounds that entitlement to JSA ended.

I agree with all said but really feel that if DWP has made an official error your client should ask for the HB/CTB overpayment not to be recovered. If DWP have sent you a letter just include it in your correspondence.

Good Luck

If there has been an overpayment! That's really the point.