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Repaying UC overpayments while challenging
Is it right,as with tax credits for example, that you should start to re pay a UC overpayment whilst you are challenging its existence?
This is current DWP policy. As Groucho Marx would say, ‘I’m against it’. I think the whole set-up is grossly unfair, especially in the absence of a Code of Conduct - the (useless) UC equivalent of COP26 vanished in Oct 2017 and has never been replaced.
Instead there is the Benefit Overpayment Recovery Guide:
They will not even suspend during MR or appeal - see pp 22-23 of the BORG.
A scandalous state of affairs - where is the motivation for DWP to avoid making mistakes when someone else always pays for them?
Thanks for that. I agree that it seems unfair especially when the mistake has been wholly due to the failure of the HMRC feed to UC.
I have just been looking through CPAG and page 1249 states do not pay back any of the money until your appeal. But I have never seen this happen. I have people who are re paying their overpayment while it is being challenged.
The problem is that the tribunal cannot find a UC overpayment non recoverable because of the cause of the overpayment. Causation is irrelevant to recoverability.
The only arguments that I have been able to put forward relate to the amount of the overpayment and the apparent lack of a decision superseding or revising earlier decisions. The latter is a technicality that can, undoubtedly, be rectified at some stage by DWP.
As all UC overpayments are recoverable, it is unsurprising that they do not wait for the outcome of an appeal to start recovering them
I’m talking about complaints regarding overpayment arising from DWP error.
The fact that there are no appeal rights relating to official error is a disgrace, and DWP’s refusal to stop recovering money when their own actions are challenged is also appalling.
The cases I have had so far include lack of (any) detail in the o/p decision, refusal to give a schedule of overpayment or to reveal or discuss any of the facts behind the decision (causation is relevant to a complaint of maladministration), outright obstruction when these details are requested, and refusal to stop recovery even when the facts scream out plainly that DWP was at fault and the claimant was not. Plus the usual shenanigans over authorisation.
Ultimately, there will be compensation for maladministration in some cases, but the process takes forever and with DWP being as obstructive as it possible can be, it now takes even longer.
Bad practice, poor customer service and complacency, all generated by the warm glow of knowing that it doesn’t matter even if DWP is 100% responsible for the overpayment, the claimant can be lumbered with it and most won’t fight back.