Wondered if anyone knows, are we as claimants entitled to know why housing benefit has been suspsended? And should we even be told they have been suspended?

I still keep wondering why last june my housing benefit was suspended, & I wasn't told. It was the arrears letter from the housing assosiation that alerted me to the fact it hadn't been paid, 2 weeks worth of rent.

Rang the council & the lady said it's ok, we thought there had been an over payment, but there isn't. I tried finding out more but she wasn't having any of it. She just said the housing assosiation will be paid.

I got another letter from housing assosiation saying the arrears were now even more, was about 5 weeks worth of rent by this time!

Rang council again & they said dont worry it'll be paid to them.

It was.

What I want to know is, shouldn't I have been notified my benefit had been suspended? And when I asked about it, shouldn't I have been told the details?

I asked the compliance officer about that when she came here last month & she said it's usually because too much was paid to the landlord, but that cant be right if it was them that wrote to me saying I was in arrears!

It's all weird. And has me thinking my recent over payment may have been sorted last june & cost me less if they had only been honest about stopping the benefit & why?

Section C8.29 of the DWP guidance manual states that

"If the DM (decision-maker) decides to suspend HB, the claimant should be informed in writing. The letter should state the date of and the reason for the suspension, together with what, if anything the claimant needs to do to resolve the situation."

When my ESA got stopped due to scoring 0 points (which has since been overturned and i was in the support group) my housing benefit also stopped, and I was not informed until my council sent me a letter asking me where my rent was. The housing benefit people, or DWP did not inform me of either stoppages, and I only found out about ESA when i had no money in my account, and housing benefit, when i had a letter after 3 weeks from the council. So yes, they should inform you, but quite often, they do not. The council then wanted me to pay rent myself until it was sorted out, when at that time, I had no income whatsoever.

From what I gathered, housing benefit is paid on a monthly basis, therefore takes longer to resolve, so yes they should inform people.

Section C8.29 of the DWP guidance manual states that

 

"If the DM (decision-maker) decides to suspend HB, the claimant should be informed in writing. The letter should state the date of and the reason for the suspension, together with what, if anything the claimant needs to do to resolve the situation."

Cheers hun. Does that apply to Local authorities too though?

And is there any reason I wouldn't have been told at the time?

Also do you know if there is any law that states claimants should have benefit reviews at certain times? It was over 2 years ago I started working part time & came off income supoort & put in a new claim for housing benefit & the compliance officer only came out to do a review last month.

Suspension of HB/CTB claims

the quote i gave is the DWP guidance to Local Authorities who administer HB/CTB

the most common reasons for suspending HB/CTB is where a benefit recipient has failed to provide evidence, or information has been received which indicates that benefit is being overpaid or needs to be amended

in either instance the guidance is for the Local Authority to notify the suspension, not sure of why you were not notified

Review of HB/CTB claims

there is no law about how often a review of housing benefit is carried out

once housing benefit is awarded, it is the duty of the benefit recipient to notify changes in circumstances, the local authority does not have a duty to carry out reviews, although it is good practice to carry out focussed reviews, e.g. if there has been no changes in earnings/tax credits/pensions for a considerable period of time

Thanks folks.

So they should notify people, but quite often dont.

Great. The lunatics have taken over the asylem. The amount of their rules we have to go along with & yet they dont even follow theirs.