HC Deb 28 April 1998 vol 311 cc100-2W
Mr. Gibb

To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security (1) when the winter fuel payments were completed; [39776]

(2) how many cases of error there have been to date in the payment of winter fuel payments, in which (a) the cheques have been dated incorrectly and(b) the cheques have been sent to people who were not eligible for them; and what are the administration costs are for correcting these mistakes. [39777]

Mr. Oaten

To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security how many cases of incorrect payment of the winter fuel payment have been identified as a result of out of date or incorrect addresses on official records. [39898]

Mr. Denham

Winter Fuel payments are one of a number of initiatives the Government have taken to help vulnerable people, especially the elderly, keep warm in the winter. A total of £400 million has been committed for two years (97/98 and 98/99), to help pensioners with fuel bills to pay. This is the first time any Government have provided additional help with heating costs to all pensioners living in the United Kingdom who receive a retirement pension or one of a number of other qualifying benefits.

The making of this year's payments has been an enormous and unprecedented exercise. In order to establish all eligible pensioners, correctly identify pensioner households, and determine the amount each should receive, it was necessary to correlate data in around 15 million computer records, involving 15 qualifying benefits, across nine computer systems. Overall, almost ten million pensioners, in over seven million households, have received a payment.

The administration of winter fuel payments is a matter for Peter Mathison, the Chief Executive of the Benefits Agency. He will write to the hon. Members.

Letter from Peter Mathison to Mr. Nick Gibb, dated 27 April 1998:

The Secretary of State for Social Security has asked me to reply to your recent Parliamentary Questions asking when the Winter Fuel Payments were completed and how many cases of error there have been to date in the payment of Winter Fuel Payments, in which (a) the cheques have been dated incorrectly and (b) the cheques have been sent to people who were not eligible for them; and what are the administration costs for correcting these mistakes.The making of Winter Fuel Payments to almost ten million eligible pensioners, in over seven million households, before the end of March 1998 has been a challenging task for the Benefits Agency. This was achieved whilst maintaining normal benefit business.Around one and half million of the poorest pensioners, those receiving Income Support or income-based Jobseeker's Allowance, received their payment of £50 during January. Almost eight and half million other eligible pensioners, for example those in receipt of state Retirement Pension, were issued with a payment of £20 or £10. The issue of these payments was completed by 24 March 1998.To determine whether £20 or £10 was due it has been necessary to establish whether the pensioner lived alone. Where we identified they were the only eligible pensioner in a household they received £20; where they lived with other eligible pensioners each received £10.Legislation requires that to establish whether £10 or £20 is due reference must be made to information held within official Departmental records. All the £20 and £10 payments issued have been based on information which originated from pensioners and is held within these official records.We are aware from subsequent enquiries from some pensioners that the official records available and used by my Agency did not always accurately reflect the correct, current address details. For example, two eligible pensioners living at the same address have differing address details held in official records and despite expecting to receive £10 each, have received £20 each.However, even though we have subsequently updated the address details the payments themselves remain correct. They have been made using official records which were in place at the time eligibility was determined. The legislation is framed in such a way that providing the payments made are supported by records held then there has not been an incorrect payment.We are therefore not aware of any £10 or £20 payments that have been made in error.Due to a computer operator error, 40,801 Income Support payments were sent out with an incorrect issue date on them. All these girocheques were replaced automatically within 72 hours at no cost to the Benefits Agency.Out of the 1.5 million £50 payments made to Income Support and income-based Jobseeker's Allowance pensioners in January we are aware that some payments were incorrectly made or duplicated. A total of 9,357 payments were made where information held within official records indicated payment was inappropriate. A further 211 duplicate payments were made to those pensioners who were in receipt of both Income Support and income-based Jobseeker's Allowance for at least one day during the qualifying week of 5 January 1998. Of the relevant payments this represents a 0.68% error rate.Details of the administration costs for correcting the above mistakes are not available.Thank you for the opportunity to explain the position. I hope that this is helpful.

Letter from Peter Mathison to Mr. Mark Oaten, dated 27 April 1998:

The Secretary of State for Social Security has asked me to reply to your recent parliamentary question asking how many cases of incorrect payment of the winter fuel payment have been identified as a result of out of date or incorrect addresses on official records.The making of Winter Fuel Payments to almost ten million eligible pensioners, in over seven million households, before the end of March 1998 has been a challenging task for the Benefits Agency. This was achieved whilst maintaining normal benefit business.Around one and half million of the poorest pensioners, those receiving Income Support or income-based Jobseeker's Allowance, received their payment of £50 during January. Almost eight and half million other eligible pensioners, for example those in receipt of a state Retirement Pension, were issued with a payment of £20 or £10. These payments were issued during March.To determine whether £20 or £10 was due, an address matching exercise was undertaken using official records held by the Department. This process aimed to establish whether each eligible pensioner was the only person entitled to a payment in the household, or was one of a number of such persons. Where more than one eligible pensioner was identified as living at an address they each received £10; where no address match was made in respect of any eligible pensioner with the address details held for all other eligible pensioners, a payment of £20 was made.The relevant legislation states that official records held by the Department shall be sufficient to determine entitlement to a payment and its amount. All the £20 and £10 payments issued have been based on information which originated from pensioners and is held within these official records.We are aware from subsequent enquiries from some pensioners that the official records available and used by the Benefits Agency did not always accurately reflect the correct, current address details. For example, two eligible pensioners living at the same address have differing address details held in official records and despite expecting to receive £10 each, have received £20 each.However, even though we have subsequently updated the address details the payments themselves remain correct. They have been made using official records which were in place at the time eligibility was determined. The legislation is framed in such a way that providing the payments made are supported by records held then there has not been an incorrect payment. We are still receiving enquiries from pensioners and do not yet know many address records were incorrect at the time payments were made.As all payments have been made in accordance with the legislative requirements there have been no incorrect payments due to address inaccuracies.Thank you for the opportunity to explain the position.