Housing benefit 1st claim and delays- help please

brians_daughter

I have found myself in a situation where until I start my full time position on 1st September that I need to claim housing benefit.

I rang my local council who said I would be entitled to help, to fill in a form online when I had found suitable accommodation (had to move out of exs house with my children)

the council told me that the claim, in line with central government legislation, would hopefully be assessed and any monies due paid within 14 days. I literally sold everything I could on eBay and picked up as many extra shifts at work I could to scrape together the months deposit and rent in advance. Moved into the property and filled in the form - 6 weeks ago.

I called 3 weeks ago, after all they told me 14 days to assess the claim and was told they were way behind and it would be "mid July" before my claim was assessed. I still held out hope it would all be sorted by the time my July rent was due, the telephonist agreed and said it was possible it would be.

Called again today and was told its "likely to be another 4-6 weeks" as they are still assessing early may claims.

My rent is due in 10 working days and I cannot pay it.
IF I didn't shop and didn't send my children to school (3 of them 2 buses each each way soon mounts up) I would have 50% of my rent - obviously we need to eat and my chi,dren need to attend school so that's not an option. I've cut down everything bill wise, I'm feeding 5 of us and a cat on £60 a week (£18 of this is baby milk and nappies)

The letting agent charges fees for every call they make to you when the rent is late, and a late payment fee.

I've filled in a complaint form, but have been told there's nothing they will do as its "strict date order" I've contacted my MP but she's away somewhere or other.

If I had known the claim would take so long I would never have rented our home, before this my 4 children and I were cramped I to my parents 2 spare bedrooms.

I have no one I can borrow it from and am at my wits end as to how I will find this money. There are extra shifts coming up at work which I have said I will do, but I won't get paid for those until August, so that doesn't help.

Sorry for waffling, but I need some advice as to who I can contact to help me with this problem.

All this is new to me, I've never claimed things like tax credits or help with housing costs in all my life until now

Anyone any ideas?

TIA Anna x

karenx

First off have you told your landlord the situation? Some can be understanding. So if you give them a call and update them on what is happening

princessdon

This seems so wrong to me. Can your parents help short term? Do you have a support worker or someone who can rant on your behalf? If not maybe people can help you draft a letter with pertinent legislation. I feel for you.

BigAunty

Contact Shelter or Citizens Advice (or ask on the MSE housing forum) about the charges levied for late rent by the estate agent. While I'm aware that landlords can charge a tiny amount of interest on arrears, I'm not sure that it is legal to charge the fees described, and at the very least, a grey area.

Are you saying that the local council have ignored your request to have an interim housing payment? That's something that a claimant can apply for after 14 days if they've submitted all the right info but the local council haven't got around to processing the claim. It's not automatic, it's something that has to be requested. If not, apply for this, I think it's also known as payment on account or something.

The Shelter website will have more information on this, and how to prevent and deal with rent arrears.

Keep pushing your MP for a response - they are there to serve you. They should be made aware that the lack of council resources are causing tenants the risk of homelessness, namely being served notice by their landlord because the rent is not paid because of the HB backlog.

djh22

Big Aunty is quite right,the Council have to make a payment on account after 14 days if they have enough information to process your claim, in reality one tends to fully determine the claim rather than risk creating an overpayment on the POA.
If possible I would pop along to the office,ask to speak to a supervisor and explain your situation,all benefit offices have to work chronologically but I'm of the opinion that the customer should be fully dealt with at the time of their enquiry,one less off of the backlog.
Good luck.

[Deleted User]

i informed coucil of our rent increase mid march,tele this week to be told its still being looked at by the rent officer almost 4 months

djh22

I doubt the delay is with the Rent Service,you could always phone them to see when they had the referral from the Council,the number is in the phone book.

brians_daughter

Thanks all, no one has mentioned any kind of payment whilst it's being processed, I will look into this first thing tomorrow.

I have told the estate agent of the problem who just replied " well, in all fairness ms x you should have looked into such issues before you signed a tenancy. It clearly states what date the rent is due on the property" so, no help from them.

I will also look into the organisations mentioned.

I am in dismay at the lack of communication and empathy from the local borough council.. I used to work for them and was made redundant a few months ago along with thousands of others and then there are situations like this happening, where it's clear there's either not enough man power to deal with the claims or it's badly managed, I assume it will be a mix of the 2 in all honesty.

Thanks everyone for your ideas and knowledge


Anna

djh22

Councils with a backlog of benefit claims are just shooting themselves in the foot,they lose a high percentage of subsidy from Central government for every claim that is not determined with 10 days of receiving all the information required,then there's a further loss of subsidy for every claim that's processed inaccurately so it's in their interest to make sure they are staffed adequately.
We can only hope that things improve under Universal Credit, sadly somehow I doubt it.

fluffymovie

Hi Djh

Not sure that the subsidy information is correct. In my LA, we aren't able to process claims within 10 working days and we have no qualification on subsidy as a result.

OP - a Payment on account is something where, the LA have everything they need to process the claim. however, in theory, if they had everything and were processing claims in 14 days there would not be a backlog.

You can certainly ask but we have a backlog in my office and we are doing things in date order to be fair on those waiting longer unless eviction proceedings are imminent.

allen35

brians_daughter wrote: »

I have no one I can borrow it from and am at my wits end as to how I will find this money. There are extra shifts coming up at work which I have said I will do, but I won't get paid for those until August, so that doesn't help.


TIA Anna x

Be aware that extra earned income will reduce your housing benefit entitlement