Social Security Benefits: Overpayments

(asked on 25th January 2022) - View Source

Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what assessment she has made of the average length of time between the incurring of debts by claimants through overpayment of benefits as a result of errors made by her Department and the issuing of a Direct Earning Attachment by her Department to recover those debts.


Answered by
David Rutley Portrait
David Rutley
Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office)
This question was answered on 28th January 2022

We do not hold the requested information broken down by individual country or region.

DWP’s primary method of debt recovery is by deduction from any on-going benefit that might be in payment. There are limits on the amount we can deduct, as prescribed by legislation. In Universal Credit the maximum we can deduct, formerly 40% of the Universal Credit Standard Allowance, was reduced from 30% to 25% in April 2021.

Where recovery from ongoing benefit entitlement is not possible, DWP will seek to agree a voluntary repayment plan with the debtor, taking into account the amount they can reasonably afford to repay each month.

Where a person fails to agree a voluntary repayment plan, we can apply a Direct Earnings Attachment which allows deductions to be taken directly from a person’s earnings. A Direct Earnings Attachment will reflect the customer’s overall outstanding balance due, rather than any individual debt. Some recovery may already have been made by other methods prior to a Direct Earnings Attachment being issued.

Anyone with overpayment deductions who experiences financial hardship is encouraged to contact the Department’s Debt Management unit. Where a person cannot afford the proposed rate of these deductions, a lower amount can be negotiated.

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