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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

to report this person (again) for Benefit Fraud?

136 replies

RagamuffinAndFidget · 22/02/2012 20:36

A woman who lives near me has been falsely claiming benefits for almost two years. Her partner works full time and earns a lot of money, they have two children, and they most definitely live together. She claims Income Support, Child Tax Credits, Housing Benefit and Council Tax Benefit. I know all this because she recently (proudly!!) announced that she had been investigated for Benefit Fraud but 'got away with it'.

Given that I know she's still falsely claiming benefits, and has been doing so for a long time, would I BU to report her to whoever it is one reports these things to?

OP posts:
ZillionChocolate · 23/02/2012 08:44

YANBU OP. I can understand why other mumsnetters disapprove of reporting suspected benefit cheats when there is very limited evidence, but that's not what you've described. If you're clear that she meant she'd gotten away with it (rather than it being an unfortunate expression of innocent relief) and that her partner does live there, then I would report her again.

Wearyworker · 23/02/2012 08:56

She maybe suspects it was you that reported her the first time and is seeing if she gives you any information you'll report again :(

saturdaygirl · 23/02/2012 08:57

I cannot believe how many of you are giving the op a hard time, I know several people who fraudulantly claim benefits and opening brag about how much they would have to earn to "make it worthwhile getting out of bed". Whilst I have not reported them I deeply resent that I get up at 6.30am everyday and go to work doing an underpaid job to enable me to pay my bills, etc and yes I am also a single parent. Why should our taxes go to people like these and it is your attitudes that has made this country what it is.

MixedBerries · 23/02/2012 09:04

Saturdaygirl, I would argue that people who know for a fact that someone is claiming benefits fraudulently and doesn't report it (and instead chooses to rant about them to strangers on the internet), is what has made this country what it is.
If you know someone claiming fraudulently, report them: National Benefit Fraud Hotline 0800 854 440

Eaglewings · 23/02/2012 09:06

Well said Saturday girl
Benefits are there for people who need them, and they still have to struggle to make the money stretch far enough.
When you hear of people who take more than they are entitled too it makes me cross as both the tax payer and those in real need pay the bill
Op it sounds as if your neighbour may not have admitted her partner lives with her, but that's just a guess

saturdaygirl · 23/02/2012 09:07

MixedBerries - I have just read my response back and yes, I should report and will report, had not thought about it like that was just of the opinion nothing would be done about it as is usually the case.

RunnyGrobbles · 23/02/2012 09:11

lesley33 can you point us in the direction of some of this evidence, please?

MixedBerries · 23/02/2012 09:12

Investigations for benefit fraud are comprehensive and rigorous and it would be very very very unlikely that you'd get away with anything once investigated. In fact you would be ordered to pay the money back and possibly prosecuted.
The reason that not many investigations into benefit fraud result in conviction etc is because the vast majority of calls to the benefit hotline are unfounded and many are malicious.

ledkr · 23/02/2012 09:12

Why does everyone get a flaming for this? The same people who call benefit bashers everytime there is a thread about benefits also get pissed off when people who are genuinely entitled get penalised cos of the likes of this woman.
Make up your mind where you stand. Benefits are for people who need them not so people can have a second income from the state.

noddyholder · 23/02/2012 09:17

Get on with your own life. There are agencies to investigate these things t is their job and tax payer pay their wages let them do their job.

lesley33 · 23/02/2012 09:18

runnygrobbles - There was a whole Panorama programme about how councils are failing to investigate organised benefit fraud and it particularly focussed on housing benefit. If I remember rightly it said that because councils claimed housing benefit back from Central Government, there seemed to be little interest in investigating fraud. And the few councils that did investigate it properly actually turned up massive amounts of organised fraud.

mixedberries - Someone in the thread earlier said they were involved in investigating benefit fraud for a living and that it was very difficult to prove people were living together. Don't know how true this is - but I do wonder how you know benefit frauds investigations are comprehensive and rigorous?

MixedBerries · 23/02/2012 09:18

Some information on benefit fraud (taken from wheresthebenefit.blogspot.com/2011/12/crimestoppers.html):

This week Crimestoppers launched a new campaign to "fight benefit fraud". They say this is in response to benefit fraud being deemed the third "most worried about" type of crime in a poll they ran this year.

This is despite the fact that there is already channel for reporting benefit fraud. And despite the fact that 96% of calls to the National Benefit Fraud Hotline are malicious or timewasting.

It's worth reading the official fraud stats to compare fraud to error and also to see how much is actually lost to fraud. But here are the fraud rates:

Income Support: 2.4%
JobSeeker's Allowance: 4.1%
Pension Credit: 2.3%
Housing Benefit: 1.3%
Incapacity Benefit: 0.3%
Disability Living Allowance: 0.5%
Retirement Pension: 0.0%
Carer's Allowance: 3.9%

The benefit with the highest rate of fraud is JSA at 4.1%. Certainly a far cry from the lies in the Daily Mail that 94% of IB claimants are fakers.

But it's because of these lies that the voters in the Crimestoppers poll would think that benefit fraud is so prevalent. And these lies go totally unchallenged in the mainstream press. This week on Question Time judge Constance Briscoe claimed there were vast swathes of fakers out there, but when asked how many she, unsurprisingly, didn't know. Next boss Lord Wolfson then claimed that JSA wasn't the benefit with the fraud problem, but disability benefits. The same disability benefits whose fraud figures I've italicised so you can clearly see just how low those fraud rates are. No-one corrected him. (Mehdi Hasan has written a blog post correcting some flawed statements from the episode, but not the disability benefits one.)

According to those same DWP figures, the overall cost to the country of benefit fraud is £1.2bn. About a fifth of tax avoided by just one company: Vodafone.

tralalala · 23/02/2012 09:20

as someone who lived on benefits I would as benefit fraudsters give genuine claimants a bad name.

TheCinnamonGiraffe · 23/02/2012 09:26

Didn't you post about this the other week op? I seem to remember then that the general consensus was that your neighbour likes winding you up?

MixedBerries · 23/02/2012 09:33

lesley33, I have trained and volunteered with the CAB and have come across and advised many accused of benefit fraud. My brother has also been investigated (as a result of a malicious phone call)- his bank accounts were trawled, his mail was inspected, neighbours interviewed.
I am also on benefits so resent fraudsters as much as anyone. Just pointing out that most who are believed to be fraudulently claiming, aren't.

ledkr · 23/02/2012 09:43

mixedberries Hijack alert. Could i pm you about my ds who is on the cusp of a kidney transplant and will have to give up work i think,work dont pay long term sick.Would you be the person to ask,our local cab is always so busy??

MixedBerries · 23/02/2012 09:48

Hi ledkr. I'm happy to try. Might take a while as I have a baby to look after at the mo (he's still in bed...hooray) but I will certainly do my best! Also, have a look at the CAB website...it's full of useful info.

TroublesomeEx · 23/02/2012 10:00

OP, if you phone your local jobcentre, there is a "to report benefit fraud press 3" option.

ledkr · 23/02/2012 10:05

Brill thanks.My baby is currently rolling around the floor crying having been up since 6 and refusing to nap grrrr. In your own time,and ill check out the website

TroublesomeEx · 23/02/2012 10:10

If people suspect people of benefit fraud I wish they would just decide that they are going to report it or are not going to report it and then act accordingly.

Bringing on to MN only ever ends up in an argument. Some people think it should be reported, some people think it shouldn't.

I can't imagine anyone ever really reaches a decision on the back of these threads because the views are so polarised.

MissLofPubia · 23/02/2012 10:23

Perhaps she thinks you reported her the time, and is trying to sniff you out? x

MissLofPubia · 23/02/2012 10:23

'First' is missing. I haven't had my coffee yet! x

TotemPole · 23/02/2012 10:27

MissLofPubia, I thought that was a possibility. A little test to see how the OP reacts.

rhibutterfly · 23/02/2012 10:38

if she was keeping quiet and not making it so blatantly obvious i'd say leave alone as i can testify working wages are dismal( i work full time) and im constantly struggling, but if she's bragging about it and splashing the cash she deserves to be reported in my opinion.As someone who was reported for benefit fraud when i was on benefits and had always declared i was working p/t time and having money deducted because of this, the interview was horrid and very scary even though i knew'd i'd done nothing wrong for this lady to be so cavalier about it all angers me

PrincessFiorimonde · 23/02/2012 10:40

I was just going to post that I think Wearyworker might be right, and now I see that others think so too. Otherwise it does seem an odd thing for her to be apparently boasting about.