Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many applications were made for a short term benefit advance in the most recent 12 months for which data is available; and how many of those applications were (a) successful and (b) unsuccessful.

The most recently available data on Short Term Benefit Advances (STBA) is shown in the table below:

The data covers the period January 16 to December 16. Data after this date is not currently available.

Data is also not available for unsuccessful applications and the difference between ‘received’ and ‘awarded’ applications in the table above does not equate to unsuccessful applications. This is because there are a large proportion of applications in which the primary benefit is paid, which negates the need for a STBA.

Notes:

Only Working Age Benefits (i.e. Employment and Support Allowance, Incapacity Benefit, Jobseeker’s Allowance and Income Support) are included in the above information for STBA applications as the number of applications received for State Pension Credit and Carer’s Allowance is not available.

Source:

STBA Applications Received - Management Information System Programme (MISP). This collation is based on clerical counts submitted by the each Centre and is Internal MI which has been agreed for use in publications of Parliamentary questions and Freedom of Information requests.

STBA Awarded - Benefit Expenditure Business Information system