Universal Credit / Fraud
Dear Department for Work and Pensions,
During the past 6 month period how many people who applied for Universal Credit had their application refused because it transpired that they had savings in excess of £16,000 which was not declared on their application form? Did any of the claimants face prosecution if their application was deemed to be fraudulent?
Yours faithfully,
Michelle Watts
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Dear Michelle Watts,
I am writing in response to your request for information, received 17th
October.
Yours sincerely,
DWP Central FoI Team
Dear Department for Work and Pensions,
Please pass this on to the person who conducts Freedom of Information reviews.
I am writing to request an internal review of Department for Work and Pensions's handling of my FOI request 'Universal Credit / Fraud'.
Thank you for your response of 26 October 2022.
I believe that the DWP holds the information I have requested and invoked Section 12 of the FOI act in order to avoid providing a response to my FOI request.
You have provided no justification as to why you think it would take in excess of 3.5 working days to extract and collate the information being requested.
I would therefore be grateful if you would re-consider my initial request or provide details as to why you think it would take in excess of 3.5 days to provide information requested.
A full history of my FOI request and all correspondence is available on the Internet at this address: https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/u...
Yours faithfully,
Michelle Watts
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Dear Michelle Watts,
I am writing in response to your request for information, received 26th
October.
Yours sincerely,
DWP Central FoI Team
Dear Department for Work and Pensions,
Please pass this on to the person who conducts Freedom of Information reviews.
I am writing to request an internal review of Department for Work and Pensions's handling of my FOI request 'Universal Credit / Fraud'.
Thank you for your response of 11 November 2022. It is regrettable that it required an internal review for you to supply the information that you did.
In your response you state that it will take 15 minutes per case at £25 per hour = 4 cases per hour.
There is a cost limit of £600 per request: (600 / 25) * 4 = 96 allowable requests.
I would like you to provide the information requested in the original FOI request for the last 96 Universal Credit (UC) claims that were made but not subsequently put into payment due to the claimant holding in excess of £16,000 not declared on their application.
In your response of 11 November 2022, you wrote: "However, due to the nature of the UC system, it is not possible to readily ascertain whether we hold information to show if the claimant declared that capital at the outset of their claim, or whether this came to light via other sources prior to the claim being put into payment. "
Could you please provide clarification as to why it is not possible to readily ascertain that the claimant declared that capitol at the outset of their claim? Surely during the UC application process the question is explicitly asked as to what savings the claimant holds?
A full history of my FOI request and all correspondence is available on the Internet at this address: https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/u...
Yours faithfully,
Michelle Watts
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Dear Michelle Watts,
I am writing in response to your request for information, received 11th
November.
Yours sincerely,
DWP Central FoI Team
Dear Department for Work and Pensions,
Please pass this on to the person who conducts Freedom of Information reviews.
I am writing to request an internal review of Department for Work and Pensions's handling of my FOI request 'Universal Credit / Fraud'.
Thank you for your response.
I am not sure if this needs to be put in to a new request of not? In light of the information you have provided:
"I can confirm that during the 6-month period February 2022 to July 2022, there were 1760
Universal Credit (UC) claims that were made but not subsequently put into payment due to
the claimant holding in excess of £16,000 not declared on their application."
Of the 1760 claims refereed to above, how many were deemed fraudulent? What action if any was taken against the claimants?
A full history of my FOI request and all correspondence is available on the Internet at this address: https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/u...
Yours faithfully,
Michelle Watts
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the response may be treated as Spam or Junk mail.
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Dear Michelle Watts,
I am writing in response to your request for information, received 11th
December.
Yours sincerely,
DWP Central FoI Team
Dear Department for Work and Pensions,
Please pass this on to the person who conducts Freedom of Information reviews.
I am writing to request an internal review of Department for Work and Pensions's handling of my FOI request 'Universal Credit / Fraud'.
Thank you for your response of 11 January 2023.
You stated: "If you were simply to request the number of people prosecuted for fraud relating to
undeclared capital within a given period, we may be able to provide you with an answer,
although I cannot guarantee that this would be the case"
I would like you to provide information regarding the number of people prosecuted for fraud relating to undeclared capital in the previous 12-month period.
A full history of my FOI request and all correspondence is available on the Internet at this address: https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/u...
Yours faithfully,
Michelle Watts
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Dear Michelle Watts,
I am writing in response to your request for information, received 23rd
January.
Yours sincerely,
DWP Central FoI Team
Dear Department for Work and Pensio
Thank you for your replay of 27 January 2023.
I am not sure as to why you made it so difficult? I can only assume that it was a conscious effort to deter people from requesting information you would rather no make generally available.
Yours faithfully,
Michelle Watts
Thank you for contacting the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP).
This is an automated confirmation that your request for information has
been received by the DWP Freedom of Information mailbox and will be
processed accordingly.
Please note that this mailbox is for Freedom of Information (FOI) or
Internal Review (IR) requests only – If you have submitted a non FOI or IR
related email then we may not be able to action it.
Timescales for responding
Freedom of Information (FOI) Requests
If your email is a valid FOI request, as per Section 8 of the FOI Act
2000, you can normally expect a response within 20 working days.
Internal Review (IR) Requests
You can normally expect a response within 20 working days.
We will respond to all valid FOI and IR requests within our statutory
timescales, if we are unable to do so then we will contact you to explain
why. Please note that we are not able to process your FOI or IR request in
any shorter timescales that you may indicate.
Receiving a response from us
Please note that email FOI and IR responses will be issued from
[email address]
We recommend that you add this address to your email contacts otherwise
the response may be treated as Spam or Junk by your email account
provider.
Further Information
Should you have any further queries in connection with your FOI or IR
request please contact us.
More information on the DWP can be accessed on gov.uk here –
[1]https://www.gov.uk/government/organisati...
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Gadawodd J Roberts anodiad ()
'I can confirm that 24 cases were prosecuted in 2022, where the primary benefit in payment was Universal Credit and the offence type was undeclared/excess capital.
This figure may include cases where other offences were also listed and/or where the capital held was in the form of undeclared property.'
Some context:
'During 2021/22 there were 244 prosecutions carried out by DWP.'
https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/9...