Terms & Conditions

[peterdelamothe]

This is something that we will be discussing at our briefing event in London in April. The current plan is that this should start in July 2019…both for housing benefit and tax credits.

New claims for both should stop for all working age in February 2019.

The big problem is the transitional protection the government promised when it introduced UC. How does it achieve that especially in relation to capital? No limits on tax credits of course. To suddenly tell all those with 16k assets that they no longer qualify for anything …esp when the next election may be around the corner….is not going to be easy.

Many issues here of course….overpayments is just one. There are already many reported issues about recovery of tax credit overpayments and universal credit. Advisers report that it is almost impossible to find out why monies are being taken from uc that are allegedly tax credit overpayments… both departments say contact each other for information. Trying to contact Hmrc is of course nearly impossible anyway. This is the problem when the right of appeal is so limited.

If the plans go ahead….and that’s a big if…then has anyone drafted a list of what hb services need to do to get ready?

.

[peterdelamothe]

Then there is council tax support. LA’s really need to start thinking about changing their scheme for April 2019. No more working age hb claims at all so what then? Cannot just rely on dwp…

It has been a long time since hb was originally supposed to be abolished. April 2013 …so a lot of the work done then is no longer that relevant.

All contributions welcome as we move through 2018.

[peterdelamothe]

Answered by: Alok Sharma
Answered on: 11 January 2018

The managed migration of legacy benefit claimants to Universal Credit is planned to start in July 2019, completing in March 2022. We are still developing the more detailed plans as to when this will occur in particular geographic areas during this period.

http://www.parliament.uk/business/publications/written-questions-answers-statements/written-question/Commons/2018-01-08/121638

[John Boxall]

Interesting……….

Given that many of those affected will be working families 'doing the right thing' I suggest that it has the potential makings of a political disaster.

Also what about all the 'in work' claimants who will be drawn into 'conditionality' that will mean a huge increase in workload on the Job Centres and of course given the increasingly arbitary and unreasonable behaviour by Job Centres that is being reported – and I suspect that some Job Centre staff may start spilling the beans on what they are being asked to do then even more fun is in the offing

Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure nineteen nineteen and six, result happiness. Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure twenty pounds ought and six, result misery. The blossom is blighted, the leaf is withered, the god of day goes down upon the dreary scene, and—and in short you are for ever floored.

Wilkins Micawber, Ch12 David Copperfield

[John Boxall]

Um, just before the next general Election due 5.5.22, that makes sense (not)

Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure nineteen nineteen and six, result happiness. Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure twenty pounds ought and six, result misery. The blossom is blighted, the leaf is withered, the god of day goes down upon the dreary scene, and—and in short you are for ever floored.

Wilkins Micawber, Ch12 David Copperfield

[peterdelamothe]

Yes…it has rather crept up hasn’t it. No more working age hb claims from next February of course …with the exception of exemp temp claims. Three children uc claims will be allowed in Feb 2019. All subject to change but I don’t think we can have more delays….6 years if they hit the targets is already unheard of.

[John Boxall]

Given though that less than 8% of the estimated claimant count is currently on UC it seems a little 'optimistic'

Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure nineteen nineteen and six, result happiness. Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure twenty pounds ought and six, result misery. The blossom is blighted, the leaf is withered, the god of day goes down upon the dreary scene, and—and in short you are for ever floored.

Wilkins Micawber, Ch12 David Copperfield

[sharonwarner]

Is there any information about what this migration may look like for Specified?  I am working with some of our local providers on funding measures and without certainty of what will happen, it makes it a bit of guesswork

[jason squire]

I doubt they will even consider migration of specified for many years, yet. They're dumping the TA stuff in 6 weeks. I think that they won't even consider specified until the HB general needs has migrated which is optimistically scheduled for 2022, I believe… so for the next 4 years AT LEAST I suggest you use HB modelling.

[peterdelamothe]

That would mean that those LA’s who transfer all their working age claims from next year…July 2019….would need to maintain IT, subsidy systems and so on for a handful of cases. In some areas, it would work out cheaper to buy specified tenants a 4 bedroom house than carry on offering a HB service to working age.

Remember also that admin grant for pensioners is due to end in 2020 so DWP are not going to maintain all this stuff for a few cases.

DWP have put in huge amounts of new cash in to the UC to make all the changes this year; end of 7 days waiting, double payment for two weeks and so on.

I think DWP / DCLG as was will clarify a lot of this in April.

[John Boxall]

So, do we think that starting July next year is realistic or not?

I understand that the DWP will be looking at 'contractual' issues to minimise penalty clauses in contracts associated with, or for HB administration.  Have they got the information for that yet?

Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure nineteen nineteen and six, result happiness. Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure twenty pounds ought and six, result misery. The blossom is blighted, the leaf is withered, the god of day goes down upon the dreary scene, and—and in short you are for ever floored.

Wilkins Micawber, Ch12 David Copperfield

[peterdelamothe]

No idea John….but this is one reason for our April event. We will be pressing DWP for some answers and I will be telling them this before. It might well slip beyond July of course but I don’t think further delay is now going to be acceptable and everyone knows this. How many years behind is it? I think the message has been made clear…no more

[John Boxall]

Well, on the other hand of course there is a massive possibility that managed migration could go horribly wrong and seriously affect the 'in work' claimants – the JAMS which will not play well politically

Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure nineteen nineteen and six, result happiness. Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure twenty pounds ought and six, result misery. The blossom is blighted, the leaf is withered, the god of day goes down upon the dreary scene, and—and in short you are for ever floored.

Wilkins Micawber, Ch12 David Copperfield

[Paul Jones]

Before we went over to Universal Credit Full Service in February 2017 we received a confirmation letter from the DWP (late 2016) explaining that an exit fund would be made available for those members of staff who could not be accommodated elsewhere within the business and that this announcement would be made nationally in January 2017.

Yup still waiting,  although I can see this was discussed at the January 2018 Practitioners Operational Meeting and the reply from the DWP was that it was with DWP solicitors.

Now that brings me back to the SFIS transfer where similar issues arose around whether LA staff fitted in to positions within the DWP, only to be told very late in the day that it was not their problem to solve and there was no pot of money to make staffing reductions despite the promise of one.

We have already seen our caseload and throughput reduced by half in the last 12 months and that's before migration commences next year.  Our staffing levels are good but one of two individuals quite rightly keep asking what ever happened to the exit fund.  

 

 

 

 

[Ben Travers]

Is Temporary Accommodation moving back to HB in April actually happening?

[Author]

Posts