Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what assessment her Department has made of the reasons for any late payments of universal credit in the last 12 months.

We published statistics on payment timeliness for new claims on 9 July 2018, available at https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/length-of-payment-delays-for-new-claims-to-universal-credit.

Analysis of claims to Universal Credit that were due a first payment in April 2018 and received their Universal Credit entitlement late showed:

• More than a third had not completed their Claimant Commitment or verified their identity on time.

• Half had another form of verification outstanding, for example completing the Habitual Residence Test, verifying capital or submitting self-employed earnings.

• In other cases, the claim was assessed as having zero entitlement on the payment due date, however information received later meant that the calculation of entitlement was subsequently revised.

For claimants that received part payment of their Universal Credit entitlement on time, the most common reasons for full payment not being made on time were late verification of housing costs and late verification of details of children on the claim.