Letter from DWP

Roseanne1

I apologise if there is already a thread but I couldn't find one and would really value some advice.

My mother received a letter recently from the DWP in connection with the retirement pension paid to my late father. It relates to the period 05/01/15 - 11/01/15, my father passed away on January 1st. They claim that they have overpaid my mother £120.93 in error, they acknowledge that it is not her fault but expect her to fork it out of her pension.

My mother went to register his death on January 8th and also availed of the "Tell Us Once" service to ensure all government agencies were notified of his death as soon as possible.

I find it ridiculous that it has taken them from January until the beginning of June (my mother and I were on holiday, which is why we are just addressing it now) and I was wondering if anyone else thought we had a case for complaining. They sent my mum details of her pension back in January showing the new amount she would get from 6th April. This was the amount she would have got had my father still been alive, however. It was soon followed by an updated letter so they must have been aware back in January that my father had died and could surely have ensured then that any overpayment was clawed back.

The last payment banked in respect of my late father's pension was 09/01/15. Why are they only clawing back this overpayment now? I'm annoyed as my mother and I, fresh from a pleasant holiday, are reminded of a terrible time in our lives, namely the loss of my father. She is then further distressed to read this letter stating that she owes them money. I know government departments are notoriously inefficient, after all I am still waiting for HMRC to get back to me regarding tax taken in error from my late father's pension, but this is surely unacceptable.

Does anyone have any experience of receving a bombshell letter like this? If so, how did you handle it? Were you able to successfully get a waiver of at least some if not all of the amount they said is due?

Any advice would be most appreciated.

lvader

I'm not sure what the complaint is, are you saying had they requested the money back a few month earlier you would have been happy to pay it?

Aged

People are not entitled to their state pension after they are dead. That's why it's important to notify a death immediately. Your mother has to pay this money back, end of story.

xylophone

Was your father paid his pension weekly? He started to receive it before 6 April 2010?

If so, his pension was being paid in advance.

He died on 1 January - his pension was paid on 5 January because the DWP did not know he had died.

The pension was overpaid so needs to be repaid.

If this will cause hardship, perhaps a repayment plan could be negotiated?

Or perhaps if you can afford it, you lend your mother the money and she repays you as and when?

Mojisola

Roseanne1 wrote: »

She is then further distressed to read this letter stating that she owes them money.

She doesn't owe them money - your father's estate does. If your mother inherited from him then she will have to pay it back but it isn't her debt as such.

It has taken them a long time to sort this out. We got letters from the DWP much sooner after Mum and Dad died. Contact them and complain but don't expect to be let off the debt.

uknick

Roseanne1 wrote: »

Does anyone have any experience of receving a bombshell letter like this? If so, how did you handle it? Were you able to successfully get a waiver of at least some if not all of the amount they said is due?

Any advice would be most appreciated.

This happened when my partner's mother passed away a couple of years ago. She was not happy at first when the letter arrived out of the blue but, as the pension had been overpaid, she accepted it.

In her case she never got the chance to discuss a payment plan as DWP took the money from her late mother's bank account without any other communication.

This did surprise her as she thought the account had been closed after she notified the bank of her mother's passing. After looking into it she found that DWP seem to have special powers to unilaterally take overpaid money from accounts.


However, as said previously, it is a debt against your father's estate. Did he leave any assets after deducting funeral costs? If not, there may be a chance DWP will waive the debt.

greenglide

What DWP can do is automatically (or manually if necessary) is to reverse a payment made by BACS which has not yet been credited by the bank (within the three day BACS cycle). This is normal action, it happens immediately.

I am not aware of them, or anyone else, being able to recover money when the account has been closed but in the case of death notified to the bank the account isnt actually closed.

atush

My father was a US civil servant who had a pension. Which was paid immediately after he died. And funnily enough, they wanted their money back so my mom paid it. His state pension had to be refunded too.

The difference was, we could see that there was payment after he died so we anticipated this. Why didn't your mother notice his pension being paid after his death?

If she isn't good with accounts, she needs to be so give her a crash course. In t he mean time, contact DWP and ask for a payment plan.

Roseanne1

lvader wrote: »

I'm not sure what the complaint is, are you saying had they requested the money back a few month earlier you would have been happy to pay it?

If we have to pay it, we have to pay it but yes the issue is with how long it has taken. I'd imagine if we'd been underpaid we'd never have heard from them and had to do the chasing, as I am going to have to with HMRC to claw back overpaid tax.

Roseanne1

Aged wrote: »

People are not entitled to their state pension after they are dead. That's why it's important to notify a death immediately. Your mother has to pay this money back, end of story.

My father died on New Year's Day. My mother notified the death a week later, which was as soon as reasonably possible given it was a bank holiday and given that she was in pieces after losing her husband of over 40 years.

She used the tell us once service when registering the death and they sent us notices showing my mother's updated state pension that month so they were aware then my father was dead. It should not be taking them a further five months to claw back overpayments.

Roseanne1

xylophone wrote: »

Was your father paid his pension weekly? He started to receive it before 6 April 2010?

If so, his pension was being paid in advance.

He died on 1 January - his pension was paid on 5 January because the DWP did not know he had died.

The pension was overpaid so needs to be repaid.

If this will cause hardship, perhaps a repayment plan could be negotiated?

Or perhaps if you can afford it, you lend your mother the money and she repays you as and when?

He was paid into my mum and dad's joint account 4-weekly. He was 76 so he did start receiving it before 2010.

He also had an occupational pension, paid monthly in advance. They had paid it into his account the day after he died. Naturally I phoned up and notified them of his death so that his pension could be stopped, I told them about this extra payment as I expected they would want this back. They never took it. My dad had arranged his occupational pension in such a way that my mother would get a portion of it after he died. She got this straightaway, she did not have to wait a month because they had effectively paid my dad an extra month of pension so they did not claw it back that way.

I know with public money it is different but I think it is a disgrace that it has taken them over five months to work out that my dad had been overpaid six days of his pension.

I'm happy to lend my mum money anytime she needs it and she knows this so paying won't be a problem if it comes to it, I just think it is a bit of a disgrace that we get this letter months after the event.