Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, with reference to the draft Universal Credit (Transitional Provisions) (Managed Migration) Regulations 2018, what process her Department undertook to decide on the period of one month as the default amount of time anticipated between a migration notice and a deadline day for the purposes of managed migration to Universal Credit.

Our priority during the managed migration process is to ensure a smooth transition with continuous support. That is why we have designed the draft regulations with the flexibility and fail-safes necessary to protect vulnerable claimants.

The draft regulations suggest a minimum one month period between the migration notice and deadline day. However, there is flexibility for a longer period to be given and to extend any given deadline, if it is identified that certain claimants require longer timescales to make a claim.

Similarly, a claimant may request an extension for completing their Universal Credit claim, as long as they have a good reason for doing so. There is no limit on the number of times that a claimant may ask to extend the deadline for making the UC claim providing they have a good reason for doing so.