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UC direct payments to landlord - how frequently & when are payments actually made?
Where a UC claimant has an APA in place & housing cost payments are made directly to landlord, I am aware that payments are not made when the payment to claimant is made. I’m sure I’ve read somewhere on Rightsnet that payments are made on a specific 4 weekly schedule but cannot fully recall the details.
UC call operators do not seem to be aware of when payments are made in specific cases (just that the claimant is entitled to payments as per the UC assessment periods & that an APA is in place).
Does anybody know when should a landlord would expect to receive a payment of housing costs in relation to assessment periods/a payment schedule?
& if so, is there any difference between a private landlord & social sector landlord when it comes to direct payments?
The amount paid is a calendar monthly sum which is either equal to the housing element used to calculate max UC, or the entire UC award - whichever is less.
It is paid four-weekly, with a skipped payment each time there would be two pay days in a single AP. I believe the payments begin a couple of weeks later than the claimant’s personal UC payments (where there is residual entitlement) so the APA is made some time after the month to which it relates. The exact delay between rent month and APA will shorten by a day or two each month and then reset itself every few months because of the 4w-4w-4w-4w-skip-4w-4w schedule
The amount paid is a calendar monthly sum which is either equal to the housing element used to calculate max UC, or the entire UC award - whichever is less.
It is paid four-weekly, with a skipped payment each time there would be two pay days in a single AP. I believe the payments begin a couple of weeks later than the claimant’s personal UC payments (where there is residual entitlement) so the APA is made some time after the month to which it relates. The exact delay between rent month and APA will shorten by a day or two each month and then reset itself every few months because of the 4w-4w-4w-4w-skip-4w-4w schedule
Thanks HB Anorak. That explains
As to when payments are actually made; is this different for each claimant or is there a specific schedule of dates on which DWP issue batch payments to landlords?
I think this is landlord specific - we have different dates for different local authority areas.
has anyone explained this to a client in a way that they understood it ?
has anyone explained this to a client in a way that they understood it ?
I think I’ve been able to help clients understand what is happening, but I challenge anybody to explain why it’s being done this way.
I’ve had to explain it to a court, a housing association, our rent team, and several clients (not all at the same time). The explanation that seemed to be easiest to understand was that the tenant gets paid 12 monthly payments every year, but the DWP pays us on 13 dates, so there’s a gap every year.
It helps that I know when our bulk payments arrive from the DWP so I can tell clients when their next one is due (and show them the pattern on their rent statement).
I’m still not sure exactly how the AP interacts with our APA bulk payment dates. Do we receive a payment on our APA date after the end of the AP, or is it after their payment date, or is there some other date/delay at play?
Then you have to explain how the la/ha want an extra weeks money due to the 53 week thing to someone with very limited English
ho hum
Then you have to explain how the la/ha want an extra weeks money due to the 53 week thing to someone with very limited English
ho hum
Especially when the LA /HA shouldn’t but don’t understand the way it works themselves.
Then you have to explain how the la/ha want an extra weeks money due to the 53 week thing to someone with very limited English
ho humEspecially when the LA /HA shouldn’t but don’t understand the way it works themselves.
… I think it’s a fair point that the LA/HA may have very limited English.
I have given up arguing with our rent/finance people about the fact that there’s no such thing as a 53 week year. The contractual rent is due weekly, and is paid four weekly by APA, so it sorts itself out over the year (except for the effect of the x52/12 calculation inaccuracy which we discussed last winter) - whether it’s paid in weeks 4, 8, 12, 16…, etc. or 3, 7, 11, 15…, etc. doesn’t really matter (and is out of the hands of the landlord anyway).