PUC0006
Written evidence submitted by The Housing Systems
We are an organisation that provides second-tier advice in the benefit sector as such our focus will be information provided by the DWP to assist advice agencies in supporting claimants with the move to UC. Overall, this has been poor and has, at times, suggested that the DWP have not properly considered the situations of claimants they are moving to UC.
The DWP has an engagement email and holds stakeholder meetings meant to answer the questions that advisers have – neither have been particularly effective. This is not a criticism of individuals but of the process as a whole. Every member of the engagement team that we have interacted with has tried their best and was clearly invested in getting us the information we were asking for / solving problems that were raised. The issues seem to be with them not being given the information they need to answer our questions.
It is clear that people answering emails for the engagement team do not have a detailed knowledge of the processes involved – often responding to detailed questions with generic guidance that was not relevant. It is understandable that they don’t have the knowledge required to answer such questions, but there should be a clear process for sending such questions on to someone who can answer.
Then, when questions are passed on, they are not answered in a timely manner (this is obviously not the engagement team’s fault) and sometimes not answered clearly.
We got a proper answer to our question 6 months after it had been asked (and after almost 520,000 Notices had been sent). During this time, advisers were unable to accurately tell people what they could expect to receive on UC because they didn’t know how to calculate the Transitional Element. As of 1st March 2024, we are still waiting for answers to questions asked on 25th January and 7th February. Most of the questions being asked should be simple to answer given they related to the calculation of the TE – something the DWP are doing for thousands of claimants. Questions such as ‘when is x element included’ or ‘what income is used’ should be easy to answer – not take months. How can claimants trust that they are receiving the correct amount of benefit when the DWP cannot easily tell them what it should be?
Beyond the lack of information shared ahead of time, the DWP do not understand that claimants will want to see how their entitlement to the Transitional Element has been worked out. A large part of a benefits adviser’s job is checking that claimants are receiving the correct amount of benefit. Mistakes happen. From early on we have seen clear mistakes in calculations of the Transitional Element (e.g., Carer’s Allowance consistently not being taken off as income). The DWP have repeatedly said that they do not see the need to share how Transitional Elements have been calculated with claimants. This means that claimants need to request a breakdown of the calculation (sometimes repeatedly) before they can check the calculation. This is unnecessary and unfair. There will be many claimants who put their trust in the DWP and assume their entitlement is worked out correctly. If they do not interact with an adviser or someone who understands the system, they may not know to check that it has been calculated correctly. If they could see a breakdown of the calculation on their account, there is a higher chance of them noticing any mistakes.
The people at the stakeholder meetings were not prepared for the depth of questions that people had. A special meeting all about the Transitional Element was put on which was great in theory but lots of questions went unanswered and some incorrect information was given (and not corrected properly). There seemed to be no proper oversight of the process as a whole – people at the meeting could speak in detail about their particular area of expertise but had no clue about how that connected to other parts of the process – and seemingly no one’s area of expertise was the calculation of the Transitional Element. The fact that these meetings could not be recorded means that there can be no proper scrutiny.
Following on from the stakeholder meeting (3 months later), the DWP shared some guidance about the calculation of the Transitional Element. They said that it answered all of our questions and that nothing in the guidance represented a change in policy or practice.
Firstly, the guidance covered the answers to the questions but did not go beyond this. We had more questions about the calculation of the Transitional Element that we had not asked because we were still waiting on answers to our most pressing questions. By the point this guidance was released, the DWP will have calculated close to 100,000 Transitional Element entitlements. The fact that there is (apparently) no clear and detailed guidance on how this is calculated is unacceptable. It means that claimants and their advisers cannot know if the Transitional Element has been calculated properly.
Secondly, the guidance contained some facts that directly contradicted things said or implied in previous stakeholder meetings but there was no recognition of this.
Thirdly, the guidance contained misleading information. It states, ‘the TSDPE.... will only be awarded to those who were on SDP and who have naturally migrated to UC’. This heavily implies that a claimant who is manage migrated cannot receive a TSDPE, but this is not true. The DWP confirmed this to us in an email 2 weeks later, but their response created more questions (which have still not been answered).
From the beginning it has been apparent that the DWP do not understand the complex situations of many claimants that they will be moving onto UC. This has meant that their approach to calculating the Transitional Element has become inconsistent.
There is no clear logic for these two opposite approaches. The DWP have not given any justification for this or acknowledged the inconsistency. The approach to the Carer Element was not made public until 30th January 2024 and means that many of the assumptions we made about how the Transitional Element is calculated based on our understanding of the DWP’s approach have now been undermined as the approach is not coherent. This has left us unable to properly advise those supporting claimants.
We have already seen examples of Transitional Elements being calculated incorrectly. This is mainly due to unearned income not being deducted appropriately. This should be a simple step in the process so the fact that this is (seemingly) consistently going wrong is worrying. Where a claimant has managed to spot this, we have seen that the DWP correct the error quickly – which is good, but it would be better if it were not needed.
We have heard examples of the people working on the Migration Notice helpline consistently giving wrong advice / information. This is especially worrying given the seemingly discretionary nature of some of the important decisions they make (e.g., whether to extend a deadline / cancel a Migration Notice). Claimants who should be able to have their MN cancelled / deadline extended according to available guidance have been refused. The DWP’s position is that these decisions are not appealable which means claimants who get unlucky with who’s on the other end of the phone could be forced to claim UC incorrectly with no recourse for challenging this.
March 2024