Forum Home → Discussion → Other benefit issues → Thread
wolverhampton postcodes
I am also a bit puddled by this section in the attached letter from the DWP above:
“In order to provide this service, 29 Mail Opening Units (MOUs) are now streamlined into two new ones in Kidderminster and Telford. Post for most DWP offices is now managed within the two units.”
So if the post is managed in Kidderminster and Telford, why is it sent to Wolverhampton? Why not to, er, Kidderminster or Telford?
Edit:
When I clicked the button at the bottom to ‘submit post’ an error message came up from Rightsnet saying it was unable to receive my submission at this time. Is this postal disorder thing catching?
LOL!!! Wonderful…
And I was puzzled by the references to Kidderminster and Telford too, Billy. I emailed my contact for clarification and was simply told we were correct in using the Wolverhampton address (so no explaination was forthcoming). I can only assume that Kidderminster and Telford are deliberate red-herrings or that the author/s of the letter were misinformed…
I can only assume that Kidderminster and Telford are deliberate red-herrings or that the author/s of the letter were misinformed…
Or that it goes to the particular Wolverhampton post code, is transferred unopened to Telford or Kidderminster and then gets all agility platformed across multiple heterogeneous clouds before finally, with a bit of luck, making its way back to your local Jobcentre, via scanning, emailing and indexing.
I wonder if DWP has a universal credit style cartoon explaining how it all works…
I also sought clarification. Have just received the following response:
From: DWP Infrastructure Modernisation Programme
Sent: 06 August 2014 13:16
To: Thomas Bidmead
Subject: RE: DWP Postal Addresses document
Hello
Thank you for your email.
Mail is delivered to Wolverhampton, sorted into postcodes and then physically forwarded to Kidderminster or Telford to be opened (as you suggested below).
Regards
DWP Infrastructure Modernisation Programme
Dear DWP
It is not just the myriad of postcodes for the mail centre that is the problem - although having the above publication is useful - but knowing which benefit office is dealing with what as well. This seems to change without notice and is different for each benefit within the same postcode. Even if we could get access to the reply envelopes we would not know which one to use. I have to ring every time and ask where to send something. A waste of my time and theirs.
It would be VERY helpful if the jobcentre finder on gov.uk also had the relevant benefit office for the different benefits. It always used to. I am sure this would increase efficiency (fewer unnecessary phone calls) and mean that the amount of wrongly addressed post would decrease.
Yours
A Very Busy Adviser
PS - how do I get hold of a supply of response envelopes?
Dear DWP
It is not just the myriad of postcodes for the mail centre that is the problem - although having the above publication is useful - but knowing which benefit office is dealing with what as well. This seems to change without notice and is different for each benefit within the same postcode. Even if we could get access to the reply envelopes we would not know which one to use. I have to ring every time and ask where to send something. A waste of my time and theirs.
It would be VERY helpful if the jobcentre finder on gov.uk also had the relevant benefit office for the different benefits. It always used to. I am sure this would increase efficiency (fewer unnecessary phone calls) and mean that the amount of wrongly addressed post would decrease.
Yours
A Very Busy Adviser
PS - how do I get hold of a supply of response envelopes?
100% agree ASH. To illustrate your point further, yesterday a client in Huddersfield showed me a letter cancelling their ESA claim that came from Sunderland Jobcentre, Wolverhampton WV98 1PG. The letter did not say why the claim was cancelled so rang DWP to ask why? Needed further info. DWP didn’t say but I asked to check where to send the info to. What do you know, not the people who sent the letter but Hull BC, Wolves WV98 1GR.
How on earth is anyone meant to know that without going through the rigmarole of ringing, being put on hold, security questions, etc?
Incidentally, security questions asked where he was born. He replied Guinea Bissau. They asked him which country that was in. Client, confused, said Guinea Bissau is a country. They replied ‘You have failed security, goodbye’
I heard that they scan post at Wolverhampton and then send it electronically to the processing office. However the software at Birkenhead benefit centre is not compatible (just a rumour though)
We had someone come to the last operational stakeholders meeting to update - they don’t scan at wolverhampton yet. They have a pilot going in Hull where they do scan and send electronically but it has not been rolled out yet. If it goes well then they will. At the moment it all trundles from one place to another in paper form - there are a number of stops on the journey -
1. It arrives at royal mail at wolverhampton where it is sorted according to postcode but not opened
2. It goes to the appropriate mail opening unit (in Kidderminster or Telford according to the wolverhampton postcode it has) where it is opened and sorted as to which benefit office it goes to and apparently even which desk it has to go to within that office
3. paper copy is then transported by TNT to that very desk - there is no need for further sorting at the benefit processing centre
So instead of just getting lost in the post - that well used DWP Chestnut, it can get lost on it way to Wolverhampton, At Wolverhampton, Kidderminster or Telford. How is that supposed to be streamlining the service when their is a greater chance of post being lost.
Hull seems like a good idea but as someone recently said here on RN, the DWP & IT working smoothly - well I won’t hold my breathe
I heard that they scan post at Wolverhampton and then send it electronically to the processing office. However the software at Birkenhead benefit centre is not compatible (just a rumour though)
We had someone come to the last operational stakeholders meeting to update - they don’t scan at wolverhampton yet. They have a pilot going in Hull where they do scan and send electronically but it has not been rolled out yet. If it goes well then they will. At the moment it all trundles from one place to another in paper form - there are a number of stops on the journey -
1. It arrives at royal mail at wolverhampton where it is sorted according to postcode but not opened
2. It goes to the appropriate mail opening unit (in Kidderminster or Telford according to the wolverhampton postcode it has) where it is opened and sorted as to which benefit office it goes to and apparently even which desk it has to go to within that office
3. paper copy is then transported by TNT to that very desk - there is no need for further sorting at the benefit processing centre
So in summary:
I post a letter to Reading Jobcentre (approximately 100 meters away)
Letter goes to Wolverhampton
Wolverhampton send letter to either Kidderminster or Telford
Kidderminster/Telford sends letter to Reading Jobcentre.
So much for carbon footprint hey?
,,,and of course for the DWP’s avowed standards - ‘When you write to us, we aim to give you a full reply within 10 working days of getting your letter (etc)’
It just isn’t happening. I have a stack of complaints about letters going unanswered for months. The complaints have gone unanswered.
1964 called on ‘Hitch-Hiker’s Guide’ earlier in this thread - are all the replies in a dark basement with no light and no stairs in a locked cupboard marked ‘Beware of the Leopard’?
I heard that they scan post at Wolverhampton and then send it electronically to the processing office. However the software at Birkenhead benefit centre is not compatible (just a rumour though)
We had someone come to the last operational stakeholders meeting to update - they don’t scan at wolverhampton yet. They have a pilot going in Hull where they do scan and send electronically but it has not been rolled out yet. If it goes well then they will. At the moment it all trundles from one place to another in paper form - there are a number of stops on the journey -
1. It arrives at royal mail at wolverhampton where it is sorted according to postcode but not opened
2. It goes to the appropriate mail opening unit (in Kidderminster or Telford according to the wolverhampton postcode it has) where it is opened and sorted as to which benefit office it goes to and apparently even which desk it has to go to within that office
3. paper copy is then transported by TNT to that very desk - there is no need for further sorting at the benefit processing centreSo in summary:
I post a letter to Reading Jobcentre (approximately 100 meters away)
Letter goes to Wolverhampton
Wolverhampton send letter to either Kidderminster or Telford
Kidderminster/Telford sends letter to Reading Jobcentre.So much for carbon footprint hey?
I wonder what Reading JC would do if you went in and gave them your letter- would they take it? It used to be that local JC+ ofices would forward post for claimants - have they stopped doing this?
[/quote]
I wonder what Reading JC would do if you went in and gave them your letter- would they take it? It used to be that local JC+ ofices would forward post for claimants - have they stopped doing this?[/quote]
Unless you had made an AJAX appointment they would refuse to help you but refer you back across the road to welfare rights (local CAB etc) for help making an appointment - thats assuming of course that staff in the job centre know what AJAX is or accept that the claimant is ‘vulnerable’ and requires an appt in the first place.
(As we understand it AJAX is the system that allows JCP to forward docs etc to the benefit centre but is only for vulnerable claimants by appointment only as only specific JCP staff conduct such appointments.
Yes, its a highly trainined occupation, taking a letter from someone.
The letter from the DWP to partner organizations at post 7 contains the following:
“When the diversions are removed any mail incorectly addressed will be suject to delays and eventually returned to sender”.
I can’t see any power in reg 4, 4A , 4B or4D of the Claims and Payments Regs that allows them to do this. The regs say that the claimant shall forward claims for certain benefits listed in 4(6A) to a designated office. Claims for other benefits and further documentation just need to be sent to “an appropriate office”, defined in reg 2 as “an office of the DWP”..........including “a postal address specified by the Secretary of State….”
Partner organizations are merely required to forward claims and information to the Secretary of State.
The letter from the DWP to partner organizations at post 7 contains the following:
“When the diversions are removed any mail incorectly addressed will be suject to delays and eventually returned to sender”.
I can’t see any power in reg 4, 4A , 4B or4D of the Claims and Payments Regs that allows them to do this. The regs say that the claimant shall forward claims for certain benefits listed in 4(6A) to a designated office. Claims for other benefits and further documentation just need to be sent to “an appropriate office”, defined in reg 2 as “an office of the DWP”..........including “a postal address specified by the Secretary of State….”
Partner organizations are merely required to forward claims and information to the Secretary of State.
Perhaps where there is no indication of which postal address to use (for example, as it is not a ‘reply’ to an MR or other letter from DWP that contains an address) we should sent correspondance to IDS or DWP solicitor direct at Caxton Hse?
For the entertainment value I recently contacted the contact centre to ask where we should now send an application for revision pending an appeal hearing under DA Reg 3(4A) now that the appeals section at our local Benefit Centre has been ‘dispanded’. They hadn’t got a clue what I was talking about let alone where within DWP the appeal had actually being dealt with - and did I receive a call back?