Overpayments

What is an Overpayment?

Causes of overpayments

What happens when an overpayment is found?

What should I do if I disagree with that decision?

What if the overpayment was not my fault?

Overpayments due to delayed benefit awards

Overpayments to landlords

How we recover an overpayment if you are still entitled to housing benefit

How we recover overpayments if you no longer live in our area

What if I cannot afford to pay the invoice in full?

What happens if I don’t pay the invoice?

What happens with council tax benefit?

What is an Overpayment?

An overpayment is an amount of benefit that we have paid to someone when they are not entitled to it, under the rules. It can happen for both housing and council tax benefit. This page shows some of the common reasons why overpayments are made, and explains how we go about claiming the overpayment back.

Causes of overpayments

There are several different reasons that cause an overpayment of benefit, including:

You may have forgotten to let us know that your income has increased, for example, Working Families Tax Credit, wages, state benefits, work pensions etc.
Somebody may have moved into or out of your home. This would mean that we will need to work out your entitlement again.
If you have other adults, such as non-dependants, living with you, their circumstances may have changed.
You may have moved out of your home and not told us.
You may have started work, or changed jobs.
Benefit being paid, when claimed fraudulently.

Please do not rely on the Department for Work and Pensions, or your landlord, to tell us about any changes that you may have.

What happens when an overpayment is found?

We do the following:

Identify the period, amount, and cause of the overpayment;
Decide whether the overpayment is legally recoverable;
Decide whether to recover the overpayment, and;
Decide from whom the recovery should be sought.
We then write to you with the details.

What should I do if I disagree with that decision?

Read the overpayment letter carefully. It will explain what the overpayment is for, and show the dates for which you have been overpaid. If you disagree with the overpayment you can:

Phone or write to us, or visit Trafalgar House to ask for an explanation.
Write to us within one calendar month of the date of the letter, to ask us to reconsider the decision. For more on this process, see our page on Benefit appeals.

What if the overpayment was not my fault?

If you reported a change to us at the time it occurred but we did not act on it for a long time, we will not automatically ask you for it to be repaid. We will consider whether you could reasonably have known that you were being overpaid benefit at the relevant time.

Overpayments due to delayed benefit awards

Sometimes, you may be claiming housing and/or council tax benefit whilst you are waiting for another Social Security benefit to be awarded. If you are then awarded the other benefit, this may result in an overpayment of housing and/or council tax benefit. We will usually ask for this to be repaid.

Overpayments to landlords

If we were paying a landlord and then found out there had been an overpayment that was recoverable, we would then decide who to recover the overpayment from. If for example, you had started work and had not told us of this change, we could take the view that your landlord could not have been expected to know of this change. Therefore, he might not know he was being overpaid so we could well decide to recover the overpayment from you. Each overpayment case is considered on its own merits.

How we recover an overpayment if you are still entitled to housing benefit

Normally, if you are still entitled to Housing Benefit, we will deduct the overpayment from your on-going benefit either:

by a series of payments over a number of weeks until the overpayment has been cleared,
by a single payment from arrears of Housing Benefit.

We can discuss the recovery rate with you in order to avoid any hardship.

How we recover an overpayment if you are no longer entitled to Housing Benefit in our area

We will send you an invoice asking you to repay the money, and this should be paid by the due date. You can pay the bill by telephone, post or in person. The invoice gives full details of payment methods available.

What if I cannot afford to pay the invoice in full?

You should contact the Customer Services Team or Housing Benefit Overpayment Team, to agree a special arrangement to pay the invoice in instalments. You could then set up a Standing Order to make the payments by the due date. Alternatively, you can pay the instalments by telephone, post or in person.

In some cases we can negotiate a realistic level of repayment over a longer period of time (by smaller regular payments). In these cases you will be expected to complete a statement of your financial affairs for an offer to be considered. However, this does not mean that any offer is guaranteed to be accepted.

What happens if I don’t pay the invoice?

If you make no contact or acceptable offer of repayment, we can then seek to recover the overpayment from certain Department of Work and Pensions (DWP) benefits. Alternatively we can seek recovery through the County Court that can result in you incurring additional costs, and in a judgement being entered against you. This may prevent you from obtaining a mortgage, credit or hire purchase facilities.

Other methods of recovery can include Attachment to Earnings, Bailiffs or a Charging Order.

What happens with council tax benefit?

Council tax benefit overpayments will be recovered by increasing your council tax bill.