Sorru for the long posting but I am truggling to get my head around the implication of ending benefit periods.

Does anyone know if the end of benefit periods means that when a tenant moves home within a LA area the HB Office will have to treat it as a change in circs - ie not end benefit claim.

Does this then mean that if the change is beneficial to the claimant (ie more HB at new address due to higher rent) the claimant has 4 weeks into which to notify ??

And what if detrimental - presumably HB will seek recovery of OP from previous landlord from date tenant moved out. But what about HB for new property - will they have to pay HB from date moved in to new property regardless of when they notify HB???

Any idea's or am I totally off the mark.

I am also concerned about what the end of benefit periods means for Regs that instruct the HB Office to invite a renewal claim eg when HB ends because IS ends when another SS benefit is awarded instead, or where claimant dies and survivng partner is invited to make claim - in both these cases the claimant is allowed 4 weeks in which to claim (under renewal regs I think)- will this still be the case from April??

Again any idea's welcome.

Well it is arguable that a change of address within the LA has always been a change in circumstances, and that therefore there has never been a need to end the benefit period for this reason anyway. It would interesting to hear from any LA which assesses changes of address in that way.

If it is a change of circs and it is beneficial then, yes, I would say the time limit applies.