Select committee: Public Accounts Committee
Conclusion 3
6th Report - DWP Customer Service and Accounts 2023-24
Published 31 Jan 2025
Addressed to HM Treasury
Public Accounts Committee DWP Customer Service and Accounts 2023-24 All items in this report Report on parliament.uk ↗ Inquiry on parliament.uk ↗
Conclusion (the committee's words)
DWP does not understand well enough the experience of vulnerable customers and customers with additional or complex needs. DWP’s customers have a wide range of vulnerabilities and additional or complex needs due to poverty, age, health problems and disabilities. DWP has some arrangements in place to support these customers, including 37 Advanced Customer Service Support Leads who provide specialist support and advice for customers at serious risk of harm, abuse or neglect. It is also using artificial intelligence to help identify vulnerable customers from the wording they use in their communications, but concedes it does not have a screening system to identify such customers on the telephone. DWP is planning to revamp its regular customer experience survey and wants to use the survey data to understand better the variation in satisfaction between different groups of customers. recommendation DWP should gather the data it needs to develop a deeper understanding of the experiences of different customer groups and act to improve the support it provides in light of its customer experience survey and any wider research findings.
From: Public Accounts Committee, 6th Report - DWP Customer Service and Accounts 2023-24 (HC 354), 31 January 2025
Government response
The government responded to the whole report on 6 May 2025.
Summary written by Accountability Index from the government's response. It is not the government's own words.The government agrees with most of the Committee's recommendations in this response, but disagrees with the recommendation that it set out when it expects to meet its PIP processing target.
- On PIP claim times, the government disagrees with the recommendation, stating the department "has to balance speed against the risk of inaccuracy". It says the Health Transformation Programme will modernise PIP "in the longer-term".
- On ESA calls, the government agrees and says it is recruiting 160 colleagues by March 2025. It states that customer wait times for ESA enquiries "will be improved by September 2025".
- On counter fraud, the government agrees and says that from April 2025 the department "will begin progressive deployment of an additional 3,000 staff", expecting the full number to be in role by 2027-28.
- On machine learning, the government agrees and gives a target implementation date of summer 2025. It says the department "will support an in-confidence session" on the 2024 fairness analysis assessment.