An overpayment of Housing Benefit is an amount that has been paid but to which there is no entitlement under the Housing Benefit regulations.
Overpayments of Housing Benefit occur for various reasons, i.e. changes in household, change in income, change of address etc.
If the Benefits Service are not informed immediately of any changes in a person’s circumstances an overpayment can occur.
You have one calendar month to appeal from when you first receive notification of the overpayment.
You can appeal against the recoverability of the overpayment not who to recover it from. This decision is at the Local Authorities discretion.
If Housing Benefit remains in payment an overpayment will be collected by weekly instalments from ongoing entitlement.
If there is no ongoing entitlement to Housing Benefit an invoice will be issued for the overpayment.
The invoice can then be paid by Credit/Debit Card over the phone, BACS (Sort Code - 30 91 56 Account no - 00465509), or via our online payments system .
If you are unable to pay the invoice in full, please email the Collections Team on sundrydebtors@castlepoint.gov.uk to arrange a repayment plan. You may be asked to complete an income and expenditure form, below.
Income & Expenditure Form [pdf] 97KB
For independent advice you may wish to contact the below
Should an invoice remain unpaid after a reminder notice has been issued, the authority can do any of the following –
Contacts:
Collection Team – 01268 882269/882225/882243
Email: Sundry Debtors