anyone here work for DWP?

AsknAnswer

As bestpud states, they cannot take you to court, but they can take it off future benefits. I had the same situation with them, the difference being, they told me I owed £200 odd. I had a crisis loan about 10 years ago for £8 odd (one days living expenses for myself and my partner at the time) that was recouped from my benefit when it went into payment. I have no idea where the figure of £200 came from. I wrote telling them this, and asked for evidence which they refused to provide. I got my MP involved and got a written apology which stated they had made an error- but no explanation as to how the error came about it in the first place.

suelees1

Social fund loans are recoverable under s78 of the SSAA. It is automatically recoverable if it is a repayable loan. So the limitation period would be six years from the date it is made under section 9 of hte Limitation Act 1980.

However that limitation only prevents the sum being recovered in court proceedings; it does not preclude the Secretary of State from recovering it by way of deduction from benefits.

Kimitatsu

joanne_d wrote: »

Hi.

No , i couldnt produce bank statements because i paid the money back in cash , not as a direct debit .

I wrote to the DWP around a year ago when i first got the letter asking me to repay , and i explained to them that i know i had the debt cleared. they told me to write a letter to them which i did but now the letters im getting are from a DEBT COLLECTION AGENCY !!

This is guna show on my credit scoring which is annoying me the most as my record has been good til now.

They say they are planning to visit me at home to discuss repayment , it must be costing them more to try to recover the debt than the debt itself is worth !!
Fed up now cos i know i paid it and now im guna probably end up paying it again just to get them off my case !! My husbands just lost his job too :mad: so we are getting by with just my part time wages and some tax credits


joanne

It doesnt have to be by direct debit - if you have a bank statement that corresponds to a similar amount, say £100 (which was a lot 10 years ago) then that could be enough for the DWP to see that there is a strong likelihood that it was oaid back, as well as a rough date.

quidsinquentin

Many years ago I had the same situation. I had a crisis loan that I had fully paid off, then I started to get letters, etc. I called them and explained and they said they would deal with it. I still got letters, then wrote to them asking for details of what I owed, etc, and stating how and when I'd paid back my debt.

That seemed to stop them. At least I got a letter saying a mistake had been made and the debt was paid in full.

dmg24

AsknAnswer wrote: »

As bestpud states, they cannot take you to court, but they can take it off future benefits.

I'm very flattered that you get us confused - bestpud hasn't posted on this thread!

tr82

You say you paid it in cash ? Was that at your local office ?

When you handed the cash over, you got your receipt. But the receptionist kept a copy of it in their "receipt pad". The receptionist also had to mark the cash into the cash book at the finance office & got the finance officer to sign the copy of the receipt.

And the finance officer then has to send a form off to Social Fund to advise that the money's been paid in, the Social Fund staff then have to reduce the balance outstanding on your loan when they get the form through.

So there's a paper trail running from when you handed in the dosh to your loan being reduced. And each cash receipt will be marked up on your Social Fund records.

The main problem is they don't hold onto Finance records indefinitely. Plus with the closure of so many social security offices, the finance records may well have been shredded by now.

I guess you can only dispute the debt if you honestly think it's been paid off & they'll need to trawl their records to see if they can find anything for your payments.

AsknAnswer

suelees1 wrote: »

Social fund loans are recoverable under s78 of the SSAA. It is automatically recoverable if it is a repayable loan. So the limitation period would be six years from the date it is made under section 9 of hte Limitation Act 1980.

However that limitation only prevents the sum being recovered in court proceedings; it does not preclude the Secretary of State from recovering it by way of deduction from benefits.

That's not quite accurate. For the purposes of Social Fund loans, it is 6 years from the date the loan was due to be repaid.

Also in Scotland (in case anyone in Scotland is reading) the limitation act in Scotland indicates a statutory barring after 5 years.

Neither makes a difference in regard to social fund loans - it is 6 years from the date it is due to be repaid, not from the date the loan was paid out.

mardatha

We had the same thing happen after 13 years ! They said overpayment of benefit & they took it off his Incapacity every week . They wouldnt discuss it at all just said they were taking it .

mandy_moo_1

i had something similar happen to me a couple of years ago

i was on benefits, and started receiving letters saying i owed them £1700 as i had not declared that i had been receiving child support payments, so i had supposedly been overpaid on benefits

now i have NEVER had a button off my childrens biological father and they're 18 and 16 now, and i got sick of writing to them to ask for proof that i DID owe this money

so i went to see a solicitor, who acted on my behalf, and after nearly 2 years of them hounding me, it took my solicitor only a couple of weeks to sort it out. they wrote to DWP asking for proof that i had been getting child support, because they must have got that information from somewhere

turns out my malicious ex had set up a fake bank account in my name, and had been paying money into it every month, then withdrawing it, so it looked like it was me getting the money. only flaw in his plan.....i lived about 300 miles away from the bank where the money kept being withdrawn from!

but as with all the other things he's done....hacking into my computer, snatching my children when they were younger, stealing 150k from his company where he worked, he got away with it because he's got friends in "high" places who manage to hush it up....but thats another story!

anyway hun, i'm sure if you seek legal advice, the solicitor will ask them for proof that you owe any money, and like someone said earlier, there'll be a paper trail somewhere

good luck xx