Recovery of an overpayment from money owed to cl by dwp and the overpayment is under dispute ...

Helllo all, and just read my title and I do hope it makes sense ?
oh well, here goes ...

Have a cl who is owed £977.00 after he won his ESA appeal.  However, DWP have sent him a letter stating they are not going to pay this because he owes them approx. £15.000.00 due to an IS overpayment, which I am helping him to appeal.

I’ve read CPAG pages 1079 - 1081 and it would appear that DWP are able to do this but surely not if the overpayment in question is being challenged ?

I’ve written a letter arguing this and await a response but once more, any thoughts etc ...

If the appeal against the IS overpayment is an in-time appeal they should indeed suspend recovery action whilst appeal is ongoing. If, however, the IS appeal is a late appeal suspension of recovery action is discretionary (and in my experience, about as likely as pigs flying and hens growing teeth).

It’s becoming more common for the DWP to offset arrears due against o/s overpayments- I’ve encountered it a lot over the past year or so. They do have discretion not to offset the arrears if it will cause the client hardship and I have had one success on that basis (but the circumstances were pretty exceptional and we had loads of evidence to back up the hardship angle). It’s worth a try though.