HB/CTB Appeals

Anthillmob

i totally agree that the notification letters we send out when claims are assessed are absolutely appaulling. even i cant make head nor tale of the ones i get to see. (the ones we send are sent from a different office sowe only ever get to see any if someone sends theirs in asking for an explanation)

Morglin

If you don't get any joy, then ask your local CAB to refer you to a Welfare Rights workers, who will have experience of this.

Councils generally try it on with the "you should have realised" routine, but it's their error, and as such, it's offical error and shouldn't need repaying.:rolleyes:

I would fight this every inch of the way - write to your MP as well.

Lin

Kimberley

Would any of you look over my appeal letter if i PM you? All i'll do is paste you my letter minus my details :beer:

Fran

The best route is through CAB/Welfare Rights because they deal with appeals all the time. As I understand it councils can take the money back if it's their error so the wording is crucial all the way along.

nottslass_2

yep,no probs - I'll also try to find a copy of the letter that I sent, as morglin says you should fight this all the way !

nottslass_2

Can I just add, the advice from Fran, to contact the cab / welfare rights is the best way to go,as she said, the wording is crucial !

Kimberley

Just bumping this thread up so some of you know what i'm talking about

I wrote the appeal letter on 24 April 2007 and I have heard nothing I've phoned them up several times and they say they are still looking into it :rolleyes:

We have a month from any letters to appeal right? So how comes they can take ages to sort things out?

How long do they have before it's too late for them to uphold their original decision?

I have an eviction notice and everything but still nothing

beccysmum

Hi Kimberley

You should write in to the council immediately and say you want to go straight to Appeal. If you do that, they reconsider anyway, so it saves more delays for you.

Did you mention the work Appeal in your original letter? If yes, the appeal should have been lodged with the Appeals Service within one calendar month of being received. If you have received no word, then the council has not actually sent your appeal to the Appeals Service.

Please let me know either way, so I can advise you of the correct course of action, and remember - they're making it up as they go along!

cheers!
beccysmum

Anthillmob

Kimberley wrote: »

I asked for a review of my HB/CTB after i was told they overpayed me more then £1000. The mistake was their error. Well i got a letter back saying the review was unsuccessful and they wrote

"We have checked the records held by this office and we can confirm that you did incude your Child Maintenance payments on your application form completed on 1 May 2006. However, it was not included as income when your claim was reassessed on 1 June 2006.

A decision has been made that although the overpayment was caused by local authority error, you would have been aware that you were being overpaid when you received the letter on 1 June 2006 showing details of your entitlement, and this letter did not include details of your child maintenance"

Now, i know full well that i gave all my income evidence to them in May 2006 and when they assessed this in June 2006. The income was also on my bank statements.

They are saying that i was aware that i was overpayed, are they trying to say i committed fraud???:eek:

Since i claimed i have always taken in proof of circumstances when needed and i get treated like this :rolleyes:

Can anyone suggest where i should go from here please

im really late with this. just re-read your original post and its the same scenario as an overpayment i created at work. it was appealed against but the decision uphelp and the lady had to pay back the o/p.

Anthillmob

Kimberley wrote: »

Just bumping this thread up so some of you know what i'm talking about

I wrote the appeal letter on 24 April 2007 and I have heard nothing I've phoned them up several times and they say they are still looking into it :rolleyes:

We have a month from any letters to appeal right? So how comes they can take ages to sort things out?

How long do they have before it's too late for them to uphold their original decision?

I have an eviction notice and everything but still nothing

the first step will be that your letter will be seen as a reconsideration. if the officer decides to write off the o/p then they will write and inform you of this but if they decide to uphold the decision then they will pass it to their appeals officer who will write to you regarding the next step.

however, it sounds as if your letter is caught up in a backlog. all LAs work differently on which work is more importants etc and sometimes letters get put to the back of the queue. which IMHO is totally wrong.

if you have got an eviction notice take this into the council and ask for an urgent assessment.

good luck