DWP warning issued as 136,000 Brits pressured to pay again £250million in advantages
The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) has been forced to issue a warning to carers who are overpaid their benefits and are being asked to pay them back
Brits who have Carer’s Allowance have been warned over paying back a huge sum owed to the Government. Eligible households can pocket up to £81.90 weekly from the government, as long as they’re putting in a shift of at least 35 hours caring for someone per week.
But there’s a cap where you can’t earn over £151 a week, or the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) will start to demand the money back. With Universal Credit you see a gradual benefits trim as you earn more, but with Carer’s Allowance, it’s all or nothing, called a “cliff edge” by the National Audit Office.
Almost 75% of people are said to own money since 2018 – that’s 80,169 to a whopping 136,730 in 2023/24, reports Birmingham Live.
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The number of cases referred for prosecution in 2023/24 plummeted to just 54 from 246 in 2018/19, according to recent findings. Meanwhile, administrative penalties, an alternative to prosecution, also saw a sharp decline, with only 75 issued compared to 774 in 2018/19.
In contrast, civil penalties surged by around 50%, with 30,129 recorded up from 20,023 in 2018/19. The National Audit Office (NAO) noted that the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) has the discretion to write off debt if it deems there’s no realistic chance of recovery or if a claimant has been deceased for over two years.
In a stark response, Carers UK chief executive Helen Walker labelled the report as “yet further evidence of a broken system that is failing unpaid carers”. She highlighted the surge in individuals with unsettled debts as “a serious failure which has left thousands of carers experiencing emotional distress and financial hardship for years”.
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