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Wrong advice from LA to claim UC
I have a client who was in receipt of ESA (WRAG), SRDL of PIP and HB in privately rented accommodation. He was then made homeless and placed in temp accommodation within a full service area but the same LA. He appears to have been advised, I think by LA staff, that he needed to claim UC which he did, although it then seems as if the LA have continued to pay housing costs. He gets the WRAG component in his UC but has lost his SDP
He is now being rehoused permanently in the same LA area but outside of the full service area.
Is there anything we can do to get him off UC and back onto his legacy benefits. This post, https://www.rightsnet.org.uk/forums/viewthread/11889/ talks about being misadvised by JCP but in this case it was the LA who wrongly advised him.
Thanks
As he is moving into a live service area, he can do what DWP calls an “elective migration” back to legacy benefits. He can tell DWP that he no longer wishes to be on benefit: this will be regarded as a change of circumstance having effect from the beginning of the current AP, so care is needed with the timing. He is then free to reclaim legacy benefits immediately. Some local authorities might think that he cannot reclaim HB for six months, but they are wrong: that restriction only affects UC claimants who have earnings that take them out of UC entitlement.
Thanks for that. The most annoying thing is that the LA continued to pay HB
His assessment period ends today so that’s handy