HB Arrears Paid Direct to Landlord

In a situation where the council has made HB lump sum arrears payment directly in to a claimant’s social landlord rent account, where all along the claimant had been making full rent payments, this has made the rent account massively in credit.

Should the claimant obtain the HB Arrears out of the rent account and put them in to his bank account, will those HB Arrears count towards his capital to affect, for example, his IRESA?

Ordinarily if the arrears had been paid to his own bank account I think HB arrears can be ignored for 52 weeks (we are not talking official error as far as I am being told, its more to do with delay that the arrears arose). All the time client had some capital that he relied on to make sure his rent was always covered.