Source · Select Committees · Public Accounts Committee
Recommendation 30
30
Accepted
DWP's Targeted Case Reviews fell short of expected UC fraud and error savings.
Conclusion
DWP set out its current plan to tackle fraud and error in its strategy Fighting Fraud in the Welfare System, published in May 2022. Its initiatives include a programme of Targeted Case Reviews to verify around 8 million existing UC claims.61 During 2023–24, Targeted Case Reviews delivered savings of £90 million, falling short of DWP’s expected savings of £115 million.62 52 C&AG’s Report (customer service), para 2.18 53 C&AG’s Report (customer service), para 2.12 54 C&AG’s Report (customer service), para 1.7 55 C&AG’s Report (customer service), paras 2.26, 2.27 56 Q 49 57 DCSA0001 58 C&AG’s Report (on accounts), para 13 59 C&AG’s Report (on accounts), para 14 60 C&AG’s Report (on accounts), para 16 61 C&AG’s Report (on accounts), para 32 62 C&AG’s Report (on accounts), para 33 15
Government Response Summary
The government commits to scaling the Targeted Case Review to full capacity by March 2025 and investing an additional £110 million in 2025-26 for counter fraud and error. From April 2025, it will progressively deploy 3,000 additional staff by 2027-28 and introduce periodic checks for Universal Credit claimant circumstances.
Government Response
Accepted
HM Government
Accepted
6.1 The government agrees with the Committee’s recommendation. Recommendation implemented 6.2 The department’s focus for Targeted Case Review (TCR) in 2023-24 was to continue to scale and stabilise a new operation that began testing in 2022-23. In adopting a hybrid resource model to reduce the impact on in-house operational resource, efforts were re-prioritised from iterating the service to make gains on productivity and hit rate to safely onboarding the commercial provider and safeguarding the future impact of TCR. TCR will be at full scale from March 2025. 6.3 As announced at Autumn Budget 2024, the government is increasing funding for counter fraud, error and debt activity by £110 million in financial year 2025-26. This investment is expected to deliver £178 million in savings to the taxpayer over the next financial year and lay the foundations for increased savings in later years – the Budget committed the department to total additional savings of £8.6 billion. 6.4 As a result of this investment, from April 2025, the department will begin progressive deployment of an additional 3,000 staff to identify and recover overpayments in the benefits system. This activity will save £78 million in 2025-26. The department expects the full 3,000 staff will be in role by 2027-28. 6.5 Alongside investment in frontline counter-fraud capability, the department will also begin deployment of additional operational resource to periodically ask Universal Credit claimants to confirm whether they have had a change in circumstances. This activity is expected to save £100 million in 2025-26. The department is also utilising funding to support evaluation of small-scale trials in Universal Credit, to test new and innovative means of preventing incorrect payments from occurring.