Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many Child Maintenance Service applications were closed as incomplete in each of the last five years.

The Child Maintenance Service (CMS) plays a vital role in safeguarding the financial welfare of children by handling applications for maintenance. However, some applications are closed as incomplete, commonly due to missing or insufficient information.

Applications which are deemed substantially incomplete, with entire missing sections, can be closed immediately. If an application is partially incomplete, CMS sends a development request asking for the missing information within a set timeframe. If a response is received the application can proceed, failure to respond typically leads to closure.

While we hold data on the overall volume of case closures, this information does not include a breakdown by incomplete cases. Producing this level of detail would require significant manual analysis and exceed the cost limits set.