Did you know, the Department of Work and Pension (DWP) can do a home visit to check your benefit payment?
This is to check that your benefit payment is correct.
The reason for this visit is to collect national statistics and help prevent fraudulent claims.
For the tax year 2014 – 2015, £1.3 BILLION pounds were fraudulently claimed
A Performance Measurement review officer from the DWP may visit you if you’re claiming on of the following benefits:
- Employment and Support Allowance
- Housing Benefit
- Pension Credit
- Personal Independence Payment (PIP)
- Universal Credit
Your name is selected completely at random to be checked. If your name is chosen, you’ll get a letter in advance telling you about the visit. You can rearrange the visit if you need to for whatever reason.
Always check the identity of anyone before allowing them into your home.
You can check the identity of the Performance Measurement review officer by:
- asking to see their photo identity card
- calling the Business Support Team and giving the review officer’s name
The officer will interview you in your home and will want to see 2 forms of identification.
They’ll also ask to see documents about money, savings and rent, eg:
- payslips
- bank, building society or Post Office accounts
- rent book or tenancy agreement
- benefits and tax credit awards
Visits usually last up to an hour but may be longer.
It may also help you to know that:
- you don’t have to let them in
- you can ask for the visit to be re-arranged with prior notice if the time isn’t convenient for you
- you can insist on having the interview at a DWP office instead of in your home.
Doing so won’t affect your benefits, although refusing to take part in an interview at all may leave you open to a fraud investigation.
Information from Direct Gov website. See here for full information…
You can see the fraud and error stats here…
