§ Mr. Jon Owen JonesTo ask the Secretary of State for Social Security what estimate he has made of the average length of time that elapses between the death of(a) a benefit claimant and (b) a pension claimant and the notification of the relevant benefit agency. [6269]
§ Mr. Roger EvansThis is a matter for Peter Mathison, chief executive of the Benefits Agency. He will write to the hon. Member.
Letter from Peter Mathison to Mr. Jon Owen Jones, dated 10 January 1996:
The Secretary of State has asked me to reply to your recent Parliamentary Question about what estimate he has made of the average length of time that elapses between the death of (a) a benefit and (b) a pension claimant and the notification of the relevant Benefit Agency (BA).Statistics on the time that lapses between the death of a customer and the notification to the BA are not kept. Experience shows that in the event of a death, the BA is notified, in the majority of cases, directly by the next of kin, solicitor, executor or nursing home. The death is usually reported direct to the BA within a few days and the computer systems are updated immediately.Once the relevant computer system has been updated any future payments will be suspended. The date of death is "broadcast" via the Departmental Central Index (DCI) to every other benefit system. This will automatically activate a suspension of future benefit payments, where appropriate, on those benefit systems.As an additional safeguard, the Registrars pass details of the deaths, reported to them, to the Office of Population Censuses and Survey. The details are then transferred to a tape which is sent to the Contributions Agency. The details from this tape are passed to the DCI which then broadcasts to every benefit computer system. This process takes approximately 3 weeks.I hope this reply is helpful.