Housing Benefit overpayment

What is an overpayment?

An overpayment is an amount of benefit you've been paid, but are not entitled to.

Overpayments usually happen following a change, and where we have not been notified in time to revise your benefit entitlement. For example, if your income has increased.

If you have a change in your circumstances, it's important to let us know straight away.

What happens if I have an overpayment of Housing Benefit?

We will write to tell you. We will let you know

• What caused the overpayment
• How much the overpayment is
• The dates of the overpayment
• How you can pay the overpayment back (if necessary)
• What to do if you disagree with the overpayment

Paying back Housing Benefit

 The overpayment must be paid by either the person who caused it or the person who received the benefit. We'll state who needs to pay it back in the letter we send.

If you are still receiving Housing Benefit we will take a weekly deduction out of your entitlement to pay back the overpayment. If we make payments direct to your landlord, we'll take your overpayment deduction out of the payment before we send it to them. You'll then be responsible for paying the resulting shortfall to your landlord.

If you're no longer on benefit, we'll send you an invoice for the full Housing Benefit overpayment.

How to pay

You can pay by:

• Standing Order - Please contact an overpayment recovery officer directly on 07766 367854 or 07740 422797 
• Kiosk (behind main reception at our  Shute End office)
• Online payment - make a payment online
• Telephone (24 hour payment line) - call  0300 456 0505 (option 4)

You can pay by debit or credit card. We accept Visa, MasterCard, Delta, Switch and Solo cards. Have your debit or credit card details and business rates account reference number to hand. 

What if I disagree with the overpayment?

 If you disagree with the overpayment you can

• Contact us and ask us to look at the decision again, or
• Appeal against the decision