I'm sorry but that's just plain wrong. The only DWP staff who can legally request this information from Argos are Authorised Officers from the Fraud department. They do this in writing. A fax would rarely be used, normally only after initial contact to chase something up or obtain missing info & an email would never be used. It's a big no no. At the moment the DWP have a list of all your earnings including tax & national insurance paid etc, in the current tax year. This has come from the Real Time Information (RTI) system. This is new & all the information on it has been provided to the HMRC by Argos on a monthly basis. Most DWP staff will know nothing about RTI & judging from what the HMRC told you on the phone I'm guessing their staff don't either. The only thing that's going to change this decision is proof that you did not get paid. You can either wait for the DWP to do this (slowly) or do it yourself. Bank statements might be a start if Argos are still unwilling to help you. You'd then need to find out what stage your case is actually at. Is it still with the section that reduced your benefit (used to be called the BIC team but this has recently changed to something else that I can't remember!), has the case been referred to fraud to investigate the overlapping periods where you received benefit & the RTI shows payments from Argos. If Fraud decide its not suitable for them it could be forwarded Compliance to contact you or sent back to BIC to calculate an overpayment. Probably not the answer you want, but hopefully this will help you understand what is going on.

Sounds like a Real Time Information case Antone. In which case Argos have provided the HMRC with details of wages paid & this in turn is passed to the DWP FEPS to correct benefit payments. Its then passed onto FES & there will probably be a note on system stating not to discuss anything with the customer whilst FES are involved. The next part may vary from area to area. Many of these cases involve relatively small overpayments that would normally be passed to Compliance. However 50% Administrative Penalties are suddenly important again so FES are under pressure to keep many of them. Some of the cases will involve employers providing HMRC with the wrong Nino (normally one digit out) or some other simple error, but nearly all should be correct. If an error is discovered the case should be sent back to FEPS to sort out. These kind of cases should start cropping up more often and I understand views on how to deal with them are changing on a regular basis.

No overpayment decision will have been made yet. As its an RTI case the BIC team have corrected you benefit from a current date & passed the case to Fraud to look at the overpayment period. Any decision & overpayment amount will come after you've been interviewed by Fraud, but I believe there's one or two issues with RTI cases at the moment, which might be causing delays in them contacting you.

I no longer work for FIS/FES, but from what I've read internally it appears that a specialist team (BIC) are being sent all the Real Time Info cases. They correct benefit from a current date & then pass the case onto Fraud to arrange an IUC & obtain an overpayment for the past period. An overpayment of less than £4000 will be considered for a 50% Administrative Penalty, an overpayment of over £4000 will be considered for prosecution. I think finn2009 has received the first letter correcting benefit from a current date. The IUC letter should come next & then the overpayment letter after the interview.

It sounds like Real Time Information via HMRC. It's potentially going to catch loads of people out & an IUC letter should follow soon after the disallowance letter.

Yes its less than 16 hours per week on average. You just need to be very careful with your calculations if you're going to go down that route. I don't know if they'll susp your ESA. My experience relates to a small local Incapacity Benefit section from several years ago & as long as the proposed work on the PW1 looked ok we'd had no reason to suspend. I've no idea how the big centralised ESA sections deal with things nowadays.

It has to be less than 16 hours per week, not up to 16 hours per week. That 1 minute between 15 hrs 59 mins & 16 hrs can make a big difference! Which is exactly what Permitted Work (Higher Limit) is designed for. It's not a way to top up your earnings which is where some people get caught out, hence the 1 year limit. Good Luck.

No one will be sanctioned if they don't have the information to hand straight away. They will be given a suitable period of time to provide it & then if they still fail to comply, benefit is suspended until they do so. Like has been mentioned elsewhere, very few compliance visits are done this way as too much time is wasted visiting properties when the claimant is not in. Nearly all will be notified. But the option is there. It's not a trick, the randomly picked Compliance cases have nothing to do with fraud. It's a benefit check/review. There is nothing sinister about it. Just because part of the guidance has changed in June 2014 (I presume it's the change of job title from Compliance officer to "Performance Measurement review officer") doesn't mean its new. Its been like this for years. Would those people whose benefits actually go up after one of these visits find them intrusive? If you don't like it, don't claim. Simple really!

Yes. Its just a Compliance visit, nothing new here. A badly written, scaremongering blog by someone with a chip on their shoulder & judging from the responses on here, it's mission accomplished for them!

Antone. Phantom address changes are often down to Nirs. Last years National Insurance Records get uploaded & if an ex-employer holds an old address it can get downloaded onto CIS. This then looks like a change of address from the date Nirs was updated & benefit is suspended. I'm not saying this has happened in this case, but as the claim is only from January, its possible.

My deleted comment was a reply to 45002 stating that he/she should become an investigator. I'm still not sure why it was deleted. To move on, I have had the (mis)fortune of attending several meetings regarding daily signing over the last 6 months. Interestingly one of the reasons mentioned for introducing it is to make it harder for people to work undeclared, cash in hand, whilst claiming benefit. I know many on here would prefer to think its all to do with sanctions (that's what Universal Credit is for), however I find it ironic that some of the of the posters moaning about daily signing on this thread - http://www.consumeractiongroup.co.uk/forum/showthread.php?423291-More-fun-for-us-JSA-Job-Seekers(1-Viewing)-nbsp are the very same people saying they don't see anything wrong with earning a bit on the side on this thread!

Sadly I agree. There is a thread from a couple of weeks ago which stretched to multiple pages of advice for someone who from the info they gave away is quite obviously committing fraud. I wasn't the first or only person to notice this, but my response to the thread was deleted! At a time when the press are quite happy to push the "all claimants are thieving sc um & scroungers" angle, to see a board that I have always thought was meant to help genuine claimants then help someone to continue committing fraud was very disappointing.

The BIC teams do benefit reviews. They have joined up with the Fraud & Compliance sections as part of the recently formed Fraud & Error Service (FES) You need to phone them & see if your benefit claim has been closed or suspended. (I presume the latter). If that is the case, you need to request the missing form/letter be sent to you again as the suspension normally wouldn't be lifted until they receive it back.

& after apparently accepting a Caution meaning that if any other benefit offence takes place within the next 5 years it is instantly prosecutable no matter how much the overpayment is!

Calm down numbers. I meant there is no internal link for ATOS to use to report a possible fraud. They are an outside organisation & if a member of staff at ATOS wanted to report something they'd have to use the fraud hotline/website like any other member of the public. In this case Liddelljohn has said he's had problems in the past with someone using his Nino, it sounds like this has probably happened again. Its not that uncommon & usually happens when an employer has entered a slightly incorrect Nino on their records & not down to ID fraud as many would suspect. The fact it appears FIS have downgraded the case to Compliance (its not just a computer picking someone at random, 45002) suggests its nothing to worry about, but if Liddelljohn wants to check he can always phone the Compliance officer to clarify it & he might want to contact HMRC just to see how messed up his National Insurance record is because if someone is using his Nino this could happen every year.

Yes, sounds like it or maybe a confused ID on Nirs. Mischief? Do you honestly think Compliance staff have time to do that? Don't be ridiculous. I'm guessing that liddelljohn has either misheard/misunderstood HMRC or Nirs as ATOS or the Compliance officer has said the wrong abbreviation by mistake. There's no conspiracy & the officer has nothing to gain from deliberately misleading liddelljohn. ATOS don't even have the facility to report a potential fraud, never mind start investigating it!

Wow Antone. Bio is one of the good guys & was just giving clear concise info in a thread where previous advice such as "You have not committed a criminal offence" is at best misguided & at worst quite dangerous. From my experience, undeclared student loan with false forms = easy prosecution (overpayment amount permitting) People88 just needs to hope that the investigator is as nice as Bio!

Not allowing your father in the IUC would suggest he's involved in the case. Does he receive a pension or any other income that has not been declared on the claims?

This appears to be a council only investigation, but the last DWP IUC invite letter I saw made no mention of the type of offence.

They might tell you the type of offence, but won't discuss anything else outside of the IUC. The only way to get any further info is via a solicitor who can ask for disclosure prior to the IUC, there's no obligation on the investigator to do this, but depending on the case most will. Expenses are not paid for an IUC. It's part of a criminal investigation. The worst case scenario for not attending an IUC is an early morning knock on the door from the police. Again it depends on the case & the DWP tend to do this more than Councils, but this can differ from area to area. From the original thread I presume HB has been paid past the change of address in July up to the recent new claim. Bank statements will show if this is correct & how much the overpayment is likely to be.

It's alright Antone, I've been called much worse.......... & I've got the IUC transcripts to prove it!

You are far more patient than me. I don't understand why anyone would come on a forum asking for advice when they have already made their mind up.

err, Compliance are part of the DWP. As Antone has already said Compliance are not the same as FIS (Fraud). They do not investigate. The information they obtain/request will come from YOU!

Simple answer, no. But I think you are misunderstanding the Compliance section. They cannot sanction you & will have no interest in your complaints, appeal etc etc. They probably won't even know about them.