We know that our team at Care Housing Association (Care) go above and beyond for our very important tenants. In this article we’re highlighting two recent examples of the added value we offer tenants in relation to housing benefit appeals.
Case 1: involves a tenant who recently received a letter stating they had been overpaid a huge amount of housing benefit – Care and the scheme support provider, Eden Futures, worked together to achieve the best result for this tenant:
Kelly Harris, Service Manager for Eden Futures explained “One of our service users received a letter stating they had been overpaid in housing benefit, the amount at that time was not stated and we were told to await the invoice. On receiving the invoice, I was totally in shock at the amount owed as it was a five figure sum, I myself called housing benefit to clarify this was correct and they said it was and sent though a breakdown. Accepting this I supported our service user to pay the amount on the bill…
Not long after paying this amount we received another invoice for slightly more than the first one! Our service user was very scared at this point because paying this one would mean that there would be no money at all left in their account and there would still be more to pay after that. At this point I decided to speak with our housing officer, Claire Atkinson, because it would now impact on their current rent payments. The support from Claire was outstanding, she came to visit our service user and sat with me to look through all paperwork, she spent hours going through everything and working out payments against savings.”
Following this meeting Claire, with support from her manager, identified that the rule of ‘diminution of capital’ had not been applied so Care drafted a letter for the tenant to use to appeal the amount being reclaimed by housing benefit. The tenant chose to send the letter and around 8 weeks later they received a response stating that they were due a refund for most of the payment made and did not owe anything towards the second invoice. Working with the tenant and support provider this way also improved their understanding of housing benefit rules to apply to future scenarios.
Result: the tenant repaid around £4000 rather than the £42000 that she was being asked for and avoided financial hardship.
Kelly’s comment: “AMAZING we couldn’t have done any of this without the support and guidance from Claire and Care Housing Association – so a massive THANK YOU!”
Claire Atkinson, Housing Officer, said “It is my pleasure to be able to be part of the team to get this great result for our tenant, housing benefit is a minefield of rules and regulations, and it did seem that a huge mistake had been made. I am so glad in a way that our tenant received the second invoice as this was how I was able to support Eden and the tenant to dispute it successfully. The result I had hoped for was to cancel off that second invoice, but for that to happen and the tenant to also get a huge chunk of money back in the process was the best feeling ever! Working together with our support providers on all our sites will always get the best results. We are all a team, working for the people who we care most about – our tenants.”
Case 2: Housing Officer Salvo Arcangelo discovered that the housing benefit award had stopped for a tenant who is temporarily away from home. Salvo was not able to speak directly to the tenant, but he promptly spoke to the support team who were not aware of the situation or a reason for the claim to stop. As Care had previously gained authorisation to discuss this housing benefit claim on the tenant’s behalf in another appeal situation, Salvo was able to learn that housing benefit had requested information from a party linked to the place the tenant was temporarily staying and this information would not be accepted from any other source.
With this knowledge Salvo requested more time to liaise with the relevant parties before the claim was fully cancelled and this was granted by the housing benefit department. He asked the support provider to try contacting the tenant and their temporary key worker to push for the information to be shared in order to reinstate the housing benefit award but this was unsuccessful. Salvo then contacted adult services and was able to speak to an appropriate social worker who helped us learn that the tenant had been moved. The social worker informed Salvo how to get in touch with the person who needed to respond to housing benefit’s information request. This took a multitude of phone calls and emails but eventually they made contact and the requested details were provided.
Result: the tenant’s claim was reinstated and backdated, recovering over £4000 arrears and again avoiding financial hardship or arrears implications for this tenant.