incapacity benefit overpayment??

Thewhizzz

hi just lookin for advice here is wot happened ,,,,,,,

i am on incapacity benefit and had a chance of permitted work in september so i did it only 3 days a week

after 1 week the guy i worked for said he could take me on part time 24 hr a week so i said ok and informed i b that i was starting part time work and they said i could claim 250 grant plus £40 a week extra for 1 yr and working tax credits and they would protect my i b for 104 weeks so if i went sick again i would go back on ib so filled all the forms in sent them off got letter telling me when benefit stopped went to work

10 weeks later i took not well again in a bad way and had to give up part time job then phoned benifits agency went back onto i b

i phoned the benefit agency 1 week later and asked them if they had sorted my claim as i needed proof of income for rent council tax benifit.

the reply i got was they have made a payment of £1600 into my account i asked them why and they said it was money they owed me i told then i was not entitled to the money ok they said we will stop the payment fine i thought,........

phoned them back 2 days later and the money is still been issued to me again i tell them i don't think im entitled to the money don't put it into my account the guy on phone says i will get someone to ring you within 4 hrs to discuss it

woman rings me i tell her its a mistake and its not my money hold on she says 2 mins later comes back yes its your money you are entitled to it ok i said whatever i said and hung up thinking they would check back now and know it was not mine


Saturday came and £1600 went into the account so i spent the lot through December on chrimbo presents for the kids


now the benifits agency is saying they have no paper work of me signing off i b

do i have to pay back the £1600 or can i tell them they made a mistake and im not paying them ???

mcjordi

Not being horrible here..

but you knew you werent entitled to the money so why did you spend it.. iirc once issue to the bank account they cant stop it..
how did you sign off IB?

im 99% sure you will have to repay this money

Thewhizzz

i sent them a letter telling them i was starting part time work and to stop my claim for i b which they did. by my reconing they have paid my by error for the 10 weeks i was working when my claim restarted

not got a problem paying them back but iv read somewhere that if the error is on there side i dont need to

cit_k

Whats the overpayment for out of interest, im having trouble figuring out exactly what is going on.

As for overpayments, if it is their fault, then they should not legally be able to claim it back, but you really need to speak to a welfare rights advisor I would say.

Thewhizzz

hi all i can think of is they have paid me for the time i was working as now they claim they have no record of me telling them i started the 24hr part time job they stopped my i b for the duration of the time i worked so they must know i started work

bigbill

I would say it's an official error overpayment and should be argued it's non recoverable.

The fact they said your due the £40 for the year, the back to work bonus, the linking 104 weeks and Tax Credits all suggest they knew fine well you were going over the 16 hours as none of these would be relevant if under 16 hours.

If you did over the 16 hours the IB should have stopped, if under 16 hours the IB cotinues, if they paid it in error thats their problem for failing to act on the info given to them.

[Deleted User]

just to add that this has recently been tested in the high court and official error isnt repayable in most circumstances