DWP ISCS (Income Support Computer System)

me_and_I

If you are of Pension Credit age and your income is lower than your "Appropriate Amount" (the minimum income level set by DWP) you will receive a ISCS payment if you have not claimed Pension Credit. It's a top-up to fill the gap between your actual income and your minimum income level and is paid as Income Support.


Best bet is to call the Pension Service on 0800 991234 and start a claim for Pension Credit.


The previous post about NI number is correct - as long as your NI number is shown on the payment reference the payment is intended for you. The Pension Service won't be able to help you as they don't process these payments but JCP might.

mrsyardbroom

dippy3103 wrote: »

Although we'd all love a £2k windfall, when it's not yours & you need to pay it back (and obviously you are honest) it's nothing but a pain in bum!

I've just come across this thread as we had one of these mysterious payments last week. You don't necessarily have to pay money back if you've been paid something and it's not your fault. Several years ago we attempted to repay an overpayment twice but the DWP refused to accept the money back as it was their mistake. According to the benefit overpayments page on the Gov.uk website.

"You’ll have to pay money back if the benefit overpayment was your fault, eg:

• the information you gave was wrong
• you didn’t report a change in your circumstances
• you gave the wrong information when you reported a change of circumstances
• there was an administrative mistake but you should have noticed the overpayment, eg you received 2 payments instead of one

You should also contact the office if you think the amount you’re being paid is wrong and it isn’t your fault."


In our case we're in receipt of pension savings credit and I'm assuming that there has been an underpayment and that the amount they've paid us now is the shortfall.

missapril75

mrsyardbroom wrote: »

You don't necessarily have to pay money back if you've been paid something and it's not your fault.

But you may have to repay official errors if it's obviously a mistake. This would include payments for the same period (duplication) and mystery payments out of the blue or those making some kind of reference to something you're not like a carer or parent or pensioner or disabled etc.

This is what is meant by the part that says

You should also contact the office if you think the amount you’re being paid is wrong and it isn’t your fault.

Assuming you have been underpaid and you get a 'correction' wouldn't be enough unless you had good reason to think you had been underpaid. For example did something change and that change led you to believe you'd get an increase which never came?

Does a notice of a higher award show an earlier date when you know you got less?

dippy3103

It's a criminal offence to "dishonestly retain a wrongful credit".

So if the o/p were to not take steps to repay this as it's fairly obviously an error, then they are leaving themselves open to prosecution. The honest thing to do would be to take steps to return it- though I would move it into a different account so it didn't get mixed up with my money whilst I make steps to repay it.

cliffandsue

Years ago I was on Income Support/IB.It took ages for them to get everything up and running. Eventually I received the backpay and all was well with the world. Because we had a mortgage they also backpaid the help for the mortgage to the building society. Some eight months later when we received our annual mortgage statement it showed that we were in credit (£3000). Seems that the DWP had made TWO identical payments to the building society. Try as I may the DWP did not want the money back as they said it was their error and that I believed that the right amount had been sent to the building society.

missapril75

cliffandsue wrote: »

Try as I may the DWP did not want the money back as they said it was their error and that I believed that the right amount had been sent to the building society.

And that is the crucial difference. As opposed to a possible groundless assumption or just saying nothing.

I had something similar with wages once. I had lots of deputising into a higher grade and the employer never did something simple like pay the difference according to the periods deputising, it was always a pay slip showing stuff like 3-5 at the higher salary, 7-11 at the higher rate pay etc and then the same periods less the salary paid.

So there would be a bunch of entries and another bunch of entries and one day they neglected make the deduction for the amount already paid. There was also back pay following a pay award, overtime and a payment of other expenses on the same slip.

There were about 30 lines on the pay slip instead of the usual one. With all that detail I didn't notice it.

They wanted the money back and I maintained I did make reasonable efforts to check and that with the training, and expertise of those in the payroll department, not to mention the help with computers, if they erred how could I be expected to identify the error.

I won my case and they wrote it off. Funnily enough the employer was the DWP (DSS then).

cliffandsue

missapril75 wrote: »

And that is the crucial difference. As opposed to a possible groundless assumption or just saying nothing.

I had something similar with wages once. I had lots of deputising into a higher grade and the employer never did something simple like pay the difference according to the periods deputising, it was always a pay slip showing stuff like 3-5 at the higher salary, 7-11 at the higher rate pay etc and then the same periods less the salary paid.

So there would be a bunch of entries and another bunch of entries and one day they neglected make the deduction for the amount already paid. There was also back pay following a pay award, overtime and a payment of other expenses on the same slip.

There were about 30 lines on the pay slip instead of the usual one. With all that detail I didn't notice it.

They wanted the money back and I maintained I did make reasonable efforts to check and that with the training, and expertise of those in the payroll department, not to mention the help with computers, if they erred how could I be expected to identify the error.

I won my case and they wrote it off. Funnily enough the employer was the DWP (DSS then).

And so they should.