Issue - meetings

Matter for Decision

The report provided an update on progress in respect of the project to recalculate and correct rents and refund any overpayment for properties affected by either of two identified rent regulation errors.

Decision of Executive Councillor for Housing

      i.         Noted progress in respect of the correction and quantification, calculation and repayment of any overpayments resulting from the two identified rent regulation errors.

Reason for the Decision

As set out in the Officer’s report.

Any Alternative Options Considered and Rejected

Not applicable.

Scrutiny Considerations

The Committee received a report from the Head of Finance and Business Manager.

The Head of Finance and Business Manager said the following in response to Members’ questions:

      i.         Noted concerns raised about the impact of repayments to those in receipt of universal credit and that this could affect their universal credit payment. Each repayment would be calculated on an individual basis but could be in the region of thousands of pounds for some tenants.

    ii.         The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) had expressed concern about repayment being made back to tenants directly, where they would be responsible for paying this money back to the DWP as there was no mechanism for the DWP to recover this money back from the tenant. There was legislation which allowed the DWP to demand the money back from the Council directly, even though payment of the rent had been paid by the tenant themselves. 

   iii.         Reassured the Committee that housing benefit refunds could be made directly back to the DWP and acknowledged Tenant Representative’s concern that some people could struggle to manage their finances. Further discussion with the DWP was required to explore whether direct repayments could be made with regards to universal credit as legislation stated that it was the DWP’s decision which approach was adopted. 

  iv.         Officers were communicating with tenants about the refund payment and the impact of this on any threshold of income considered for benefits. Tenants had also been advised that the refund payment could be used to pay off any other debts that they may have.

    v.         In response to a question about the ‘anonymous’ tenants detailed in section 4a of the report. Advised that the Housing Management Renting System had the GDPR function switched on which meant that tenant’s information was deleted (in accordance with data protection rules) 6 years after they ceased to be a council tenant and when there was a ‘nil’ balance. This created problems for repayment as the council could calculate how much a tenant had paid but information about the person who lived in the property was not held. Former tenants were able to provide information to support any claim for a refund of overpaid rent.

The Committee unanimously resolved to endorse the recommendation.

The Executive Councillor approved the recommendation.

Conflicts of Interest Declared by the Executive Councillor (and any Dispensations Granted)

No conflicts of interest were declared by the Executive Councillor.