Housing benefits overpayments
An overpayment is an amount of housing benefit that has been paid to you, to which you are not entitled. This usually happens when your circumstances have changed but you have not told us.
We will always ask for the money to be returned. If the overpayments were made directly to your landlord we may recover the overpayment from them. You will be notified of the overpayment and the way it is being recovered.
What if I cannot afford to repay?
If you can not afford to repay the overpayment in one lump sum you can contact us to discuss repayment by instalments. A housing benefit overpayment can be recovered from your ongoing housing benefit entitlement or from some other benefits such as income support or job seeker's allowance.
What happens if I do not pay?
If you do not repay the overpayment using any of the above methods we can take you to court. The court allows us to:
- use an attachment on earnings. This means your employer gives us some of your wages to repay the overpayment
- use bailiffs
- use a charging order.
If we need to use the court then costs will be added to the outstanding debt. You will have to repay the costs as well as the original overpayment. If the overpayment is a result of fraud, the council will usually seek to prosecute.