Select committee: Work and Pensions Committee
Recommendation 50
Third Report: Universal Credit: the wait for a first payment
Published 19 Oct 2020
Paragraph 208
Addressed to Department for Work and Pensions
Work and Pensions Committee Universal Credit: the wait for a first payment All items in this report Report on parliament.uk ↗ Inquiry on parliament.uk ↗
Recommendation (the committee's words)
Faster Payments offer the Department a quick and efficient way to pay claimants. They could, if more widely used, reduce the time that people have to wait for a first payment. The Department already has plans to increase its use of Faster Payments. That will have costs and will require work across multiple bodies, including the Treasury and the banks. We recommend that the Department maintain its target to increase its proportion of Payments permitted by banks, to shorten the fifth week of the Universal Credit: the wait for a first payment 87 Universal Credit process. We urge the Department to set out in more detail its proposed strategy for rolling out Faster Payments, including its expected timings and its plans for engagement with the banking sector, in response to this report.
From: Work and Pensions Committee, Third Report: Universal Credit: the wait for a first payment (HC 204), paragraph 208, 19 October 2020
Government response
The government responded to the whole report on 12 January 2021 (deadline 19 December 2020).
Summary written by Accountability Index from the government's response. It is not the government's own words.The Government notes the Committee's report and, in the sections summarised here, declines to adopt most of its main recommendations, saying that advances mean "No one has to wait five weeks for a payment".
- On research into the impact of the wait, the Department states that it "will not be conducting nor commissioning any research", saying resources were reallocated to the COVID-19 response.
- On a starter payment, the Government says there "is not a need for a starter payment in UC" because New Claim Advances are available, and cites increased fraud risk. It says it will "not be introducing" more frequent payments by default.
- On the deduction cap, it points to the lowering from 30% to 25% of the standard allowance, "effective from October 2021", and says further lowering "would not be an effective way to protect vulnerable claimants".
- It states that it "does not agree that monthly updates" on Work Coach recruitment are appropriate, but will ensure "relevant updates" are supplied to Parliament. It also reports a commitment to increase Work Coaches by 13,500 by end of March 2021.