Terms & Conditions

[junderwo]

This is the reply I have received from the DWP regarding referrals:

Following the abolition of benefit periods it was necessary to develop a new process that would ensure an annual rent officer referral. The process needed to be pinned to an anniversary date relevant to rent allowance cases where a referral is required. The application date was chosen as the earliest date in that process.

As you are aware a case is excluded from further referral for 52 weeks from the date of the original or previous referral. Although this does have inherent difficulties as you say, if the referral were to be made in advance it would effectively bring forward the annual referral year on year.

The Rent Officer determination is no longer tied to a fixed period award of benefit because payment of HB is now effectively open ended. Without a provision to halt the payment of benefit because a new determination is needed a subsequent determination has to take effect through a superseding decision. As the amount of the new determination would not be known payments of benefit will therefore continue at the existing rate, using the existing Rent Officer determination until the new determination is actioned. The new Rent Officer’s determination will take effect from the first day following the end of the same 52-week period that has prompted the further referral. Any arrears would be paid or overpayment calculated depending on the determination’s affect on benefit entitlement.

We are further refining the regulations with effect from the date of the April 2004 changes. Where an increase in the Rent Officer determination results in an increase in benefit in cases where the rent is paid weekly, or in multiples of a week, the increase will take effect from the first day of the benefit week in which the first day following the end of the 52 week exclusion falls. Where a decrease in the Rent Officer determination results in an decrease in benefit the decrease will take effect from the first day of the benefit week following the date the determination was received by the local authority for all claimants. This is designed to avoid overpayments.

I hope this will be of use to you. We will be issuing a circular shortly on the new system of Rent Officer