Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what the proportion is of universal credit claimants who receive an advance payment; what the average value of the advance payment is; and what percentage of claimants have received 100 per cent of the value of their first universal credit payment in the most recent month for which data is available.

Around 60 per cent of new claims take up an advance. Subject to some fluctuation, this rate of advance take-up has been broadly consistent over the last 12 months. This shows that claimants are being made aware of advances and are using it where they need this help.

The average advance amount for new claims is around £400.

Our latest published data shows that consistently around 85% of new claimants are being paid in full and on time. This can be found at: https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/universal-credit-statistics. In many cases where full payment is not made on time, it is due to unresolved issues such as: claimants not accepting their Claimant Commitment or passing identity checks, or having outstanding verification issues, such as housing costs and self-employed earnings. In order to support claimants to claim, we have taken steps to improve verification processes. For example, we have listened to feedback and built processes into the system to make it easier and quicker for people to verify their housing costs, for example through the landlord portal.