Source · Select Committees · Public Accounts Committee
Recommendation 22
22
Accepted
Department plans enhanced support for vulnerable Universal Credit migrants, including home visits and reviews.
Conclusion
The Department expects to provide more support when it begins moving more vulnerable legacy benefit claimants to UC from April 2024. In September 2023, it began a phase of testing involving 2,000 households on Housing Benefit, Income Support, 36 Q 20 37 Department for Work & Pensions, Move to Universal Credit complaint statistics: April 2023 to December 2023, 11 March 2024 38 Q 27 39 PUC0004 40 PUC0002 41 Q 23 42 C&AG’s Report, para 2.17 43 C&AG’s Report, para 2.18 44 PUC0002 45 PUC0005 Progress in implementing Universal Credit 15 income-based Jobseeker’s Allowance, or a combination of benefits.46 The Department told us that, in light of the testing, it had worked hard to develop an enhanced support package for more vulnerable legacy benefit claimants.47 We asked the Department to clarify what support would be put in place for someone going through the migration process. The Department said that it would now be writing to claimants 11 weeks after sending a migration notice to remind them to claim, before attempting three outbound calls and writing to let them know it would be arranging a home visit from its visiting officers if it did not get a response from these calls.48 Additionally, the Department told us that, before stopping people’s legacy benefits, it would review all termination decisions to ensure it had exhausted all possible avenues of support.49 It also said that it could always extend a household’s migration notice beyond the usual three months if it had not been able to provide support.50
Government Response Summary
The government agrees and states the recommendation is implemented, detailing how it has estimated resources, will monitor the enhanced support journey for vulnerable claimants, introduced a Complex Case Coach role, and will oversee monitoring of the enhanced support journey.
Government Response
Accepted
HM Government
Accepted
4.1 The government agrees with the Committee’s recommendation. Recommendation implemented 4.2 The department has estimated the resource needed for enhanced support and will monitor the journey of claimants who are provided with this support, including claim rates, phone claims and support needed to make a claim. The volume of phone calls made and referrals for face-to-face visits will also be monitored to ensure operational capacity is available to continue to deliver the enhanced support journey. 4.3 A Complex Case Coach role has been introduced to review cases where the initial stages of the Enhanced Support Journey do not result in a claim to Universal Credit, this will include an full assessment of whether a face-to-face visit will be required. 4.4 The Move to Universal Credit Implementation Control Centre will oversee the monitoring of how many claimants are in the enhanced support journey, paying focus to those who have been receiving enhanced support for a prolonged period and detecting, at an early stage, if there are concerns around resourcing for this function, including the face-to-face support element.