Local Housing allowance mistake?

euros72

Just noticed on the my latest annual uprating of my LHA that it says the size criteria used is 3 rooms.
I only live with my partner and my child and live in a 2 bedroom flat. Im really worried now that ive been getting overpaid for the last year.
Im sure the forms i filled in stated there were only the three of us and that we had a 2 bedroom flat but it looks like they have made a mistake.

Anyone else been in this situation or have you checked yours is correct?

calleyw

euros72 wrote: »

Just noticed on the my latest annual uprating of my LHA that it says the size criteria used is 3 rooms.
I only live with my partner and my child and live in a 2 bedroom flat. Im really worried now that ive been getting overpaid for the last year.
Im sure the forms i filled in stated there were only the three of us and that we had a 2 bedroom flat but it looks like they have made a mistake.

Anyone else been in this situation or have you checked yours is correct?

Does it say 3 bedrooms or just 3 rooms.

I assume that you have a lounge or living room so I assume that counts towards the three rooms including the bedrooms.

But I am sure that someone else will tell be along to give a better or more correct answer than me.

Yours

Calley

euros72

3 rooms but i thought they based it on the number of bedrooms required for the property (in our case 2 with us only having one child) and they ignore the other rooms.

Its really annoyed me because up until todays letter i had no idea that the housing allowance they had based it on was for 3 rooms. On no other correspondence can i see this. if i had known i would have pointed it out a long time ago.

Conor_3

Basically it's like this.

The HB office have a list which states the minimum number of rooms required for a certain family makeup. They will only pay benefits based on this. So for example, if a single person is renting a 4 bedroom house, they will only pay rent based on a single bedroom house/flat as a single person only needs one room. The extra number is for a living room.

A parent(s) with two boys would be allowed 2 bedrooms, 1 boy and one girl, 3 bedrooms as they can't share etc plus a living room.

euros72

i am being overpaid because i have one child and a 2 bed property and it says my claim is being based on 3 rooms

lil_me

Claims for HB were based on ROOMS allowance. LHA is based on BEDROOMS allowance.

The allowance for you on HB was based on 3 ROOMS (inc one as a living room) on LHA your entitlement is based on 2 BEDROOMS.

No you haven't been overpaid from what I can see if you were on HB based on rooms (as it says rooms on your entitlement letter rather than bedrooms) rather than LHA previously (was only a few areas which were pioting the scheme)

Unless you need to make a new claim you will likely stay on the same benefit rate.

If you contact the housing office that pays your benefit they should be able to clarify this for you.

alwaysonthego_2

I agree with the above poster it is based on three rooms, not bedrooms

euros72

I hadnt claimed housing benefit for a few years then i had to a year ago due to redundancy. I noticed it still said housing benefit at the top of the calculation sheets but at the bottom it just said local housing allownace rate £80 which is about ten pounds more than my rent but as we still had one low income coming in we just had most of our rent paid
I seem to remember querying this back then and was told is was right. Since then my partner was made reundant and we were on income support for a while and we actually received £80 per week.
Since then my partner has gone back to work and we are currently receiving nearly £70 a week help. I intend to return to work in June so hopefully we wont have to claim any more but on none of the old calculation sheets has it ever said anything about rooms before. The only time that has come up is when you actually make the claim and have to say how many there are in the property. id be very surprised if i had said we had three bedrooms.
it all seems very confusing to me.

dmg24

euros72 wrote: »

I hadnt claimed housing benefit for a few years then i had to a year ago due to redundancy. I noticed it still said housing benefit at the top of the calculation sheets but at the bottom it just said local housing allownace rate £80 which is about ten pounds more than my rent but as we still had one low income coming in we just had most of our rent paid
I seem to remember querying this back then and was told is was right. Since then my partner was made reundant and we were on income support for a while and we actually received £80 per week.
Since then my partner has gone back to work and we are currently receiving nearly £70 a week help. I intend to return to work in June so hopefully we wont have to claim any more but on none of the old calculation sheets has it ever said anything about rooms before. The only time that has come up is when you actually make the claim and have to say how many there are in the property. id be very surprised if i had said we had three bedrooms.
it all seems very confusing to me.

So have you rang them?