If we decide that you have been paid too much housing benefit or council tax benefit, we call this an 'overpayment'. If we decide that you have been overpaid, we will send you a letter which will tell you the following:
- Why we gave you too much benefit
- How much the overpayment is
- The period the overpayment is for
- If you have to pay back the amount and how
- How you can appeal if you think this is wrong
There are different ways in which we may ask you to repay your overpayment.
Overpayments of council tax benefit
These are sent directly to your council tax account and you will be sent a new council tax bill telling you how to pay the money you owe.
Overpayments of housing benefit
If you are still getting housing benefit:
We will recover your overpayment from your ongoing housing benefit entitlement. We will write to you about how much we will be recovering from your benefit each week.
For this example, assume we have decided to recover £10.00 per week (your amount will be different to this):
Assuming that both the rent and benefit are £50.00 per week, if we recover £10.00 per week from this entitlement, this would leave Housing Benefit of £40.00 per week towards the person’s rent. The person claiming housing benefit would therefore have to pay the extra £10.00 to their landlord from their own money.
If you are not getting housing benefit anymore:
We will send you a bill advising you how much to pay back. You can pay this back to us in full or you can contact us to make an instalment arrangement.
Who can we recover from?
- The customer
- The customer’s partner, but only where deductions from ongoing benefit can be made, and only if the customer and partner were partners both at the time the overpayment was caused and at the time it is to be recovered
- The person to whom the benefit was paid (e.g. claimant / landlord or other)
- A person who has caused an overpayment because they failed to tell us something
- The estate of a deceased person
- The appointee or the power of attorney for the claimant
The Benefits Service has the discretion to decide who the overpayment will be recovered from. Each case will be considered on its own merits.
We will not normally recover an overpayment from a landlord if they have informed the council or the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) that they suspect there has been an overpayment, as long as:
- The overpayment has been caused by the customer trying to commit a fraud, or by deliberately not telling us about a change in circumstances
and
- The Benefits Service is satisfied that the landlord has not been party to the occurrence of overpayment
How to avoid an overpayment of benefit
If you have a change in your circumstances affecting your housing or council tax benefit entitlement, you must report it to the Benefits Service straight away.
If you do not know whether a change will affect your entitlement, please contact us without delay to find out. It is important that you notify us immediately of your change so that you avoid being overpaid benefit which you may have to pay back to us. It is also an offence not to report a change in circumstances as soon as you can.
What if I cannot afford to pay back the overpayment in one go?
If you are having problems paying back an overpayment, please get in touch with us and we will make an arrangement with you. Please complete the 'income and expenditure form' on this page and return it to the Benefits Service.
For more information on changes in circumstances or on benefit fraud investigation, please follow the menu options on this page.
If you need more information on overpayments, please contact the Benefits Service.