Help writhing a Housing Benefit appeal letter.

Lme85

I have recently informed my local council that i returned back to work from maternity leave. When i got my award summery they claim i have been overpaid £2600.......
I rang them right away and the woman i spoke to told me when i informed them i was on maternity leave & gave them my smp wage, they input my weekly wage of 124.25 as if i had said it was for the month. So instead of my wage being £125 they had it as £28pw. She agreed with me that it is there error but they are totally entitled to claim it back.

I should have checked my full award summery but it was 32 pages long and i didn't really know what i was looking at to be honest.
The advisor told me i can appeal but ill need a very strong appeal letter, this is where i need help!!

Today i received in the post a letter telling me that they want my 2 most recent payslips (no problem) and 2 last months bank statements which is a problem as my childrens father pays there childcare. She just told me to say i pay cash as they dont consider mataninence at all so therefore will look like i dont pay childcare, my child minder has no
problem giving me receipts for cash as that is how its paid every week. But will this be accepted?

Non the less i am appealing as i feel it is unfair i should pay for there error.

Any advice, tips ect will be greatly received, thanks.

Lme85

Obviously i have. This overpayment is for over a year and living with 2 children on smp it really didn't make that much of a difference that i thought to have questioned. The amount they are going to claim back is more than the monthly overpayment so that i am going to feel, which is why i am appealing. I know i will have to pay some back but i dont think the full amount is fair.

hurricanewyn

Hiya

First of all you need to make sure that the council have applied underlying entitlement to your overpayment. That's were your overpayment is reduced by the amount of benefit you would have gotten had they done the claim correctly in the first place. It should mention it in the letter you got telling them of the overpayment, if not ring them and ask them if it's been done. If they haven't, get them to do it. They won't need anything in writing to do it.
The lady you spoke to is correct. Errors made by the council can be recovered from you if it is reasonable to expect you to know you have been overpaid. What this means is, would any reasonable person in your situation know that their income had been input incorrectly? The argument that the letter was too long and complicated generally won't work as it probably says somewhere on the back of each page that you should seek help if you don't understand the contents. Dig out the original 32 page letter now if you have it and see what the wages section says. If you don't have it, ask for a copy.
Personally, I'd get help with this one. CAB are good, but if you can get to an office, Shelter are better. Ask the council to hold off on recovering an overpayment until they receive your dispute but get onto it pronto.