Guidance

LA Welfare Direct 2/2022

Updated 12 December 2022

Contact

If you have queries about the:

• technical content of this bulletin then contact details are given at the end of each article
• general content and distribution of this bulletin, contact [email protected]

Who should read

All Housing Benefit staff

Action

For information

Editorial

February is finally here and with it, I hope, better weather. However, the level of work and challenges ahead for us all shows no sign of letting up.

You’ll see in this month’s edition that the financial year ending (FYE) March 2022 quarter 2 (Q2) speed of processing statistics have been published. The numbers are marginally higher than for the same period last year but your efforts in maintaining high levels of service are to be commended.

Intelligence gathered from our Performance Relationship Managers engagement with you shows that work pressures and COVID-19 related impacts significantly affected Q2. Indicative data and anecdotal intelligence suggests that performance will continue to be impacted throughout FYE March 2022, due to the ongoing impact of the pandemic. We will continue to support you through this period and into FYE March 2023, where key initiatives such as Verify Earnings and Pensions and Housing Benefit Award Accuracy (soon to be relaunched) will be key in enabling prevention and reductions in Fraud and Error in Housing Benefit.

As spring is just around the corner so is the conference season and I hope we’ll be able to get out and see you face-to-face at some of these events. We’re starting to think about our key messages and topics to cover for upcoming events, so look out for further details in the coming weeks and months.

Take care until next time.

Darren Baker
Head of Change & Communications, Fraud, Error & Debt Team

Further extension to deadline: Submission of HB final tested claims and assurance reports/audit certificates for financial year ending March 2021

1. Final tested claims for Housing Benefit (HB) subsidy and subsequent HB Assurance Process (HBAP) reports (in England) and audit certificates (in Scotland and Wales) are normally provided to the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) by 30 November following the end of each assurance period.

2. As advised in LAWD5/2021, following stakeholder engagement feedback, DWP initially extended the standard submission deadline from 30 November to 31 January for financial year ending (FYE) March 2021 and March 2022 assurance periods.

3. DWP has considered recent representations from local authorities (LAs) and audit firms facilitating HBAP that due to continued pandemic related resource pressures and the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities extension to the deadline for the Local Authority Final Accounts work, that a high percentage of assured HB subsidy claims in respect of the FYE March 2021 assurance period will not be completed by the extended deadline of 31 January 2022.

4. DWP understands that these pressures continue to affect the FYE March 2021 so, to provide certainty to LAs and the audit firms facilitating HBAP, DWP is further extending the deadline to 28 February 2022.

5. HB subsidy forms a significant part of DWP’s Annual Reports and Accounts and carries the expectation that provision of actual HB subsidy spend can be incorporated into each accounting period on a timely basis. HB subsidy claims submitted post November in any accounting period impacts that expectation and raises a risk to the accurate provision of the department’s annual reports and accounts. Therefore, DWP encourages LAs to work with reporting accountants and auditors to finalise work on the HB subsidy claim.

6. Where LAs believe final tested claims/audit certificates and assurance reports will not be submitted to DWP by 28 February 2022, they should contact the LA Payments Team at [email protected] providing detailed reasons for not being able to do so. Extension requests will only be considered in exceptional circumstances and on a case-by-case basis.

HB subsidy withholdings

7. By exception, all HB subsidy withholdings applied to LAs ceased following the April 2020 subsidy payment.

8. Following a review period, withholdings recommenced on 1 July 2021 for all outstanding final tested claims up to and including for FYE March 2019. The application of withholdings will be extended and applied to all outstanding final tested claims up to and including those for FYE March 2020. The withholdings will continue for FYE March 2019 and be applied at 5%, increasing to a maximum of 35%, in line with normal practice, for FYE March 2020.

9. HB expenditure is significant (around £17 billion for FYE March 2020) and the HB subsidy claim and assurance process is key to providing the required assurances for this spend. Whilst we appreciate that these are unprecedented times, the importance of reporting accurate spend to published timescales is important.

10. We will continue to monitor the FYE March 2021 situation and review the withholding position as a matter of course.

New Adult Disability Payment in Scotland

11. The Scottish Government’s next benefit, Adult Disability Payment (ADP) will open for new applications in pilot areas from 21 March 2022.

12. This new payment will be administered by Social Security Scotland and replace the Personal Independence Payment (PIP), which is currently delivered by DWP.

13. Working Age adults with a disability or health condition, who are not already in receipt of PIP or Disability Living Allowance for Adults (DLA), and living in Dundee City, Perth and Kinross and the Western Isles LA areas will be the first to be able to apply from 21 March 2022.

14. Further LA areas will be introduced in phases until ADP rolls out nationwide across Scotland from August 2022.

15. Claimants with ongoing awards of PIP or DLA do not need to apply for ADP. Their awards will be transferred automatically to the new Scottish system from August 2022, with no break in entitlement or payment. Further details on this will be shared when it becomes available.

Impact on LAs

16. LAs should follow business as usual procedures and treat ADP in the same way as they currently do with PIP. For example, if severe disability premium is payable on a HB claim because of a claimant’s PIP award the same severe disability premium will be payable as a result of their ADP claim.

17. LA’s IT software suppliers are making the required changes to HB systems and will provide further updates when this has been completed.

18. As with current PIP claims, DWP will notify LAs that the benefit cap does not apply where ADP has been awarded.

19. If a claimant notifies their LA that they are in receipt of ADP and the benefit cap is still being applied, the LA should complete and return the benefit cap email notification template to DWP using the existing business as usual process.

Timeline

20. The timeline for the introduction of ADP is as follows:

• Phase one: pilot takes place in Perth and Kinross, Dundee City and Western Isles from 21 March 2022
• Phase two: pilot takes place in Perth and Kinross, Dundee City, Western Isles, Angus, North Lanarkshire and South Lanarkshire from 20 June 2022
• Phase three: pilot takes place in Perth and Kinross, Dundee City, Western Isles, Angus, North Lanarkshire, South Lanarkshire, Fife, City of Aberdeen, Aberdeenshire, Moray, North Ayrshire, East Ayrshire and South Ayrshire from 25 July 2022
• Nationwide rollout across Scotland from 29 August 2022
• People who currently get disability benefits from DWP will have their awards transferred to the new Scottish system in stages after the new benefits are introduced from summer 2022

21. More information on the ADP rollout schedule in August 2022 across the rest of Scotland will be shared when it is available.

22. You can find out more about ADP on www.mygov.scot.

Local Housing Allowance rates for FYE March 2023

23. On 25 November 2021 the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions announced the Local Housing Allowance (LHA) rates for FYE March 2023 will be maintained at the elevated cash rates agreed for FYE March 2021.

24. The LHA rates for FYE March 2023 were published, in line with normal procedures, on the last working day of January 2022 and will be applicable from April 2022. They can be viewed online for England, Scotland and Wales.

Updated Right of Access Request guidance for LAs

25. Where an LA receives a Right of Access Request (RAR) (also known as a Subject Access Request) in relation to data provided to LAs by DWP, DWP is content for you to share the information requested providing there is no Special Category Data (previously known as sensitive data) included, as defined within General Data Protection Regulation.

26. If the request includes Special Category Data, LAs should liaise with DWP by email to [email protected] before releasing any information.

27. If you have any questions about the content of this article, contact the email address given above.

Calculating HB speed of processing method

28. DWP publishes statistics on HB speed of processing each quarter. Recent user engagement identified that an explanation as to how we calculate average speed of processing could be helpful to our users.

29. The quarterly publication data is extracted from SHBE (Single Housing Benefit Extract). This is the mechanism by which HB data is provided by LAs to DWP.

30. DWP measures the average speed of processing for HB in calendar days. The table below shows three fictitious claims for one LA and the number of processing days calculated for each example:

Date most recent HB claim was received (LDHBREC)	Date of first decision on most recent HB claim (LDHBDEC)	Number of processing days (measured in calendar days)
18 March 2021	28 April 2021	42
6 April 2021	23 April 2021	18
22 November 2020	19 April 2021	149

Total number of processing days for April 2021

209

The calculation

31. The calculation used for the average speed of processing is as follows:

• number of processing days for a claim is calculated as the difference between the date the most recent HB claim was received (LDHBREC) and the date of the first decision on the most recent HB claim (LDHBDEC). In the above example, 18 March is day zero and 28 April is day 42

• the total number of processing days for any given LA is calculated by adding up all the processing days for every claim. So, using the examples in the table above, the total number of processing days for April is 209 calendar days

• the total number of processing days is then divided by the total number of claims to get the average speed of processing for HB in calendar days. This calculation is always rounded to the nearest calendar day. So, using the three example claims in the table above the average speed of processing is 70 calendar days (in other words 209 divided by 3).

32. Again, using the example, as all three claims were processed in April 2021 (based on the LDHBDEC field) the data would be published in the April data of the 2021 to 2022 quarter 1 publication.

33. Do note, we cannot amend data that is reported in SHBE once it has been submitted by an LA. As explained in our methodology note, if data quality issues exist and we cannot verify the results in time for the release then our current practice is to omit the LA data from a publication release at a monthly and/or quarterly level.

34. If you have any questions regarding this article, please email [email protected]

Publication of HB speed of processing statistics for July to September 2021

35. The department published HB speed of processing statistics and associated data for quarter 2 (Q2) on Wednesday 26 January 2022.

Some key points

36. During Q2 of FYE March 2022 there were 86,000 new HB claims and 1.1 million change of circumstances to existing HB claims processed in GB.

37. For new HB claims, volumes have remained stable since last quarter, and there has been a decrease of 5,200 (6%) when compared to the same quarter a year earlier (quarter 2 2020 to 2021).

38. For change of circumstances to existing HB claims, there has been a decrease of 500,000 (31%) since last quarter and a decrease of 92,000 (7%) when compared to the same quarter a year earlier.

New Claims

39. The average time taken to process a new HB claim during Q2 for FYE March 2022 was 20 calendar days. This is three days higher than Q2 of FYE March 2021.

Change of Circumstances

40. The average number of days taken to process a change of circumstance to an existing HB claim during Q2 FYE March 2022 was 8 calendar days. This is two days higher than Q2 of FYE 2021.

To note

41. HB speed of processing statistics do not include figures for the London Borough of Hackney Council from October 2020, because of a cyber-attack suffered by the LA impacting data provision and, more recently, data quality. Therefore, speed of processing figures for Hackney will be omitted in line with our standard approach for handling missing data or data with quality concerns. Analysis for Hackney using historical data shows that this is likely to affect volumes of HB claims by 1% at GB level and around 5% at regional (London) level. The GB and regional level speed of processing figures are not impacted by the omission of Hackney data. HB speed of processing statistics do not include new claims data for Tandridge District Council for September 2021 and Oxford City Council for August and September 2021. These LAs had IT system upgrades and this impacted data provision and data quality. The omission of this data is also in line with our standard approach for handling missing data and data with concerns around quality.

42. The data in this release should be seen in context with operational emergency measures, policy changes and easements due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Understanding changes to LA service delivery

43. Since the start of the pandemic, LA-PED has fully recognised how LAs have reacted at pace to the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic and shown tremendous resilience in adapting and transforming the services they provide.

44. We are now keen to gain a better understanding of the innovations LAs have made during this time in delivering services across your authorities. Specifically, LA-PED would like to learn more about:

• digitalisation
• automation
• service re-designs or transformation initiatives
• use of improved data flows
• any other types of IT innovations

45. LA-PED would also like to understand how we can widen our support to LAs with any of the above as well as facilitate good practice sharing across all LAs. Therefore, during your regular liaison calls, our Performance Relationship Managers (PRM) may ask you about some of the above topics.

46. Alternatively, if you would like to tell us about any council-wide changes your LA has made before your next PRM, call you can send any contributions to [email protected]

47. As always, we appreciate your continued partnership working.

Invitation to the next Data sharing and IT consultation and engagement forum

48. The next forum will be held on Monday 21 March from 11am to 12 noon through MS Teams.

Joining instructions

49. The joining instructions are:

• the MS Teams link to this forum has been shared in the version of the LAWD2/2022 that was sent directly to each LA’s single inbox

• note: It is more difficult to ask questions through dial-in so, if you anticipate having questions, we recommend joining through MS Teams where possible

• aim to join the event two or three minutes before the start time, as we intend to start promptly

• speakers will be muted by default but instructions will be given during the event if you want to ask a question

Forum agenda

50. The forum agenda is as follows:

• a 15-minute introduction DWP, covering projects recently delivered, projects currently in delivery, insight into future planned projects, as well as the most recent common issues that have been reported to us

• 30 to 45 minutes of questions from LAs on the call about the projects and matters covered in the introduction and any other IT and data sharing questions and issues LAs may have

• if time allows, 15 minutes focused on suggestions from LAs about future data sharing, data matching or automation projects that DWP could consider funding and delivering

51. The meeting will be recorded and published on Glasscubes.

52. The forum is open to all LAs and we would be beneficial for every LA to have at least one representative dial into the forum to help us maximise feedback. Each LA representative should:

• seek input and feedback from as many of their colleagues as possible prior to dialling in, for example, questions they might want answered
• have knowledge, at least at a high level, about data sharing, data matching and current IT topic areas
• feedback to their colleagues about how the conference call went, including the answers to the questions we asked

53. We look forward to your participation on the call. However, If you have any questions in the meantime contact [email protected]

Citizens Advice to continue to deliver ‘Help to Claim’ Universal Credit support

54. Free confidential and impartial support to help people make a Universal Credit claim will continue to be delivered across Great Britain by Citizens Advice.

55. The Department for Work and Pensions ‘Help to Claim’ support will be delivered independently by Citizens Advice, in partnership with Citizens Advice Scotland, following a further £21.3 million investment

Decisions by the Upper Tribunal

56. Decision Making and Appeals Leeds have not been made aware of any new HB/CTB decisions by the Upper Tribunal.

57. A selection of decisions of the Upper Tribunal (UT) are published on their website. Do be aware that there is an undefined time lapse between decisions being issued and their appearance on the website.

58. f you have any queries about cases before the UT Judges or courts, please contact us by email at [email protected]

New Legislation

59. The following Statutory Instruments (SIs) have been laid:

• Occupational Pension Schemes (Charges and Governance) (Amendment) Regulations 2022, SI 2022/10, laid on 10 January 2022
• Personal Protective Equipment at Work (Amendment) Regulations 2022, SI 2022/8, laid on 10 January 2022
• Pneumoconiosis etc. (Workers’ Compensation) (Payment of Claims) (Amendment) Regulations 2022, SI 2022, laid on 13 January 2022
• Mesothelioma Lump Sum Payments (Conditions and Amounts) (Amendment) Regulations 2022, SI 2022, laid on 13 January 2022
• Social Security Benefits Up-rating Order 2022, SI 2022, laid on 17 January 2022
• Guaranteed Minimum Pension Increase Order 2022, SI 2022, laid on 17 January 2022
• Occupational Pension Schemes (Collective Money Purchase Schemes) Regulations 2022, SI 2022, laid on 17 January 2022
• Occupational and Personal Pension Schemes (Disclosure of Information) (Requirements to Refer Members to Guidance etc.) (Amendment) Regulations 2022, SI 2022/30, laid on 17 January 2022
• Scotland Act 2016 (Social Security) (Adult Disability Payment and Child Disability Payment) (Amendment) Regulations 2022, SI 2022, laid on 24 January 2022
• Universal Credit and Employment and Support Allowance (Claimant Commitment Exceptions) (Amendment) Regulations 2022, SI 2022/60, laid on 24 January 2022

60. Copies of SIs can now be downloaded from legislation.gov.uk

What’s new on our HB pages on www.gov.uk.

61. The following items can be found on the website link shown:

Document type	Subject	Link
LAWD1/2022	Editorial Performance Measurement Housing Benefit annual programme 2022 Update: Local Government Data Sharing Transformation – Universal Credit data share Update: Payment Deduction Programme end-to-end review HB Decisions by the Upper Tribunal New Legislation What’s new on our HB pages on www.gov.uk	LAWD1/2022