Good morning, I have found this site via various google searches and really hope someone can help. I have been claiming ctc & wtc as a single person but have a partner living with me. Stupid I know. It was always a case of I will let them know but never have. I have become totally reliant on the money due to large debt issues, payday loans, doorstep loans etc. No excuse, Im just rubbish with money and an idiot. Yesterday I received a letter from HMRC compliance saying they have reason to believe Mr X is living at my address and wish to check a 6 month period of my current claim. I rang up, told the adviser that my partner indeed lives here since the date they are querying, but volunteered no more info than that and was not asked. He said he would stop the claim and a letter will be sent re overpayments (around £3000 I think). He said I do not need to do anything further. Is this all I have to do? Is it only the 6 months stated in the letter they seem to be concerned about? I am terrified they will check my last 5 years of claims as I no doubt will owe tens of thousands. 30000 + I know have been stupid and everything else. Obviously havent slept worrying about the implications of court, jail and so on. My partner knows not a thing about this. Has anyone else ever been in this situation or similar that could give me some idea of what happens next. I am so ashamed of myself and feel ill at the thought of prosecution and it all being made public. Please please can someone reply as I feel bereft. Thank you for reading.

Hi everyone (apologies in advance for length), I finished a fixed term contract on Tuesday, and the next day put in a claim for Universal Credit. This is my first time on UC and I have my initial meeting this Monday. I last claimed in April when it was still a case of JSA/separate housing benefit, so having it in one lump sum monthly will definitely be more convenient. However, I do have a couple of minor concerns about what may or may not have changed since UC came into effect. 1) When I was on JSA, one or two members of staff tried to put pressure on me to give access to my Universal Jobmatch account. I wasn't happy to do this for the same reasons as lots of other people - I'm an adult who can and should be trusted to do my own jobsearch and don't appreciate being monitored like a naughty child, so it's mainly out of principle. Also, although I have an account and don't have anything against the site per se, it is not the only method of jobsearching and so wouldn't reflect the full amount of jobhunting I had actually done. Therefore, I prefer to write it all down on paper and was able to quote the necessary lines from the Toolkit to back up my right not to allow access. 2) Again, while on JSA, a different advisor threatened to "take action against me" if I did not lay my jobsearch out in the exact format ("What I will do", "what I did") in the A4 booklet. I preferred to do it like a diary, as this gave me more room to write down every employer I had applied to, whereas he wanted me to cram a week's worth into half a page (it did say to be as specific as possible!). Basically I'd have been writing the same thing twice every week but in different tenses, which is plain stupid. Anyway, I spoke to the Jobcentre manager (again quoting the bit from their Toolkit where it says they can't specify to jobseekers what form their evidence takes) and the manager confirmed that as long I was keeping a record, that was fine and that they do allow flexibility. Now, to my concerns regarding Universal Credit. I notice in my confirmation email about Monday's meeting, it says: "Please make sure you've registered with Universal Jobmatch on GOV.UK and bring your login details with you to the meeting." I'm fuming at this! Even the most militant advisor/coach under JSA never asked me for these! What I want to know is, can I still use those nuggets from Chapter 3 of the Toolkit to defend my right to privacy? I notice they all say "We cannot mandate/specify to a JSA claimant..." I don't want to be caught out by semantics. I know it would be illegal under Data Protection law to do this, but I also know that wouldn't bother some DWP staff. I can't find any evidence this has changed, but can anyone confirm that those quoted sections from the Toolkit are still valid under Universal Credit? I have written them down to take with me on Monday in case anyone gives me a hard time, but need to make sure it's still correct. Thanks in advance.