UC think my tenancy agreement is fraudulent/contrived. Advice please

[Tenancyproblems]

I have just moved in to a privately rented property. I do not know the landlord personally and had never spoken to them before in my life until I applied to the advert on the open rent website.

I receive (atleast I did) the housing element of universal credit to help me to pay my rent.

When I moved in I uploaded the tenancy agreement on my UC portal as advised. They came back to me and said I need to provide evidence of my address and housing costs.

I was confused as the rent etc is all detailed in the tenancy however the landlord promptly wrote me a signed letter addressed to me at the new place FAO universal credit with the required details to support my claim.

Somebody called me the next day to clarify a few points (making sure I don't know the landlord personally, asking who else lives with me etc)

I answered honestly and UC said they'd get back to me shortly with a decision on my housing costs. That decision came back and the verdict was they would not be paying my housing costs. A generic letter was put up on my UC portal saying I hadn't provided enough evidence to satisfy them that I lived where I said I live and haven't shown evidence of housing costs(??)

Confused, I called them pretty upset and said I don't know what's going on here but I've done everything asked of me. The UC representative was sympathetic and said she would escalate it to a manager who would look at the claim.

Days later I check my UC portal and the decision has come back exactly the same. I'm entitled to my personal entitlement but no housing costs.

I contact them again, and again, and eventually they make an appointment for me to take my documents (IE tenancy etc) to be verified at my local job centre - that appointment was today.

I arrive there at 1pm with my tenancy agreement and some new documents I've been able to collect (a council headed letter regarding my children's school meals, more paperwork from the energy company) and before I've even sat down the advisor tells me that it's already gone above his head and the decision maker has rejected the housing element of my claim.

I'm completely baffled by this point and ask him what the problem is. He said there was several things "the decision makers" weren't happy with, a spelling mistake of the landlords name was one thing he mentioned but he offered no further context. He went on to say that during lockdown they saw a huge influx of fraudulent / contrived claims and now they leave no stone left unturned. He asked whether I could provide anything else. I said well no I've only been here just over a week I don't have anything else.

I'm then reminded of the tenancy deposit protection scheme and he asked whether I could provide the certificate for that. I was able to and said of course. He added a "to do" task for me on my journal which was exactly the same "to do" as I've done three times now (uploading the same documents) and said I could ask for a mandatory reconsideration and I'm now at the mercy of the same decision maker again I think.

If they reject it again I won't be able to remain here as I can't afford to.

I don't know what's going on here. I don't know the landlord personally. I'm not trying to defraud anybody of anything. I'm a lone parent who has never had any issues with the housing element of UC and now I may be at risk of homelessness.

Landlord is equally as dumbfounded. We are both completely genuine.

What on earth am I going to do?

I can definitely fill in my details on the C.T envelope and get that back to them

Or you can go online and contact them
https://www.gov.uk/guidance/start-paying-council-tax

I'm planning on giving CAB a call first thing in the morning and will ask for an appointment ASAP so I can go down with my tenancy agreement.

It was created on one of those online tenancy agreement generators, is 22 pages long and really comprehensive. My previous landlord used a similar platform to create that tenancy and I had no issues with his one.

I had no idea you could lose your bought home due to council tax arrears, that's very concerning for me as you said it'll be me who is kicked out. I don't fancy my chances being at the mercy of the council to house me. I've been turned away from them multiple times over the years as I didn't qualify for housing and there was none available anyway.

Brilliant ill do that now. I'd rather do it online and not write all over her letter if she's coming to collect it. Thank you

That's so stressful that they say you haven't provided enough evidence, but it is not possible to upload more!
Let alone the fact that they won't clarify what sort of evidence might be acceptable.

I hope it gets sorted out soon and you can relax and enjoy your new home.

Shelter are brilliant and have loads of info on their website.

Thank you all for the suggestions and support 🙂

I've just sent off the online form to the council telling them when I moved in. I made a point of mentioning the letter I've seen here and explained how I'm now the sitting tenant as of my move in date but am not responsible for any outstanding council tax prior to this period.

I'm on there as I type! It seems v helpful definitely

Oh bollocks I've put the wrong move in date on the council tax form, I put March instead of April. That's something else I'll need to chase up and sort out now. Argh. What a bloody week.

I reckon that the landlords residential details are the property you are renting.
she may be registered to vote and obv for council tax there.
I can’t imagine how she could be so behind with council tax for it to say home at risk if she has had tenants in for 6 years.
the tenant is liable for any arrears not the landlord.

I also think open rent is quite easily open to fraudulent tenancies been set up, meaning if I had a room to rent out I could easily list it, rent it to my partner and then create a tenancy document so maybe UC are more cautious around open rent tenancy agreements

Council tax will not chase you for any owed tax before the date you moved in. It will have a different account number, even though it’s fir the same property

i would guess your multiple names on envelops means a few to many UC claims for rent have been received ^in to short a time* for that particular address and the question of “do you live with your LL, and that’s set a bell off at the job Center - thus the man’s comment about “ well you could just print out a tenancy agreement

go to council and put in a claim for DHP asap as UC are not paying your rent element, it’ll take a while but might help you and you have nothing to lose trying.

The mandatory reconsideration is the most important next step. Did you ask for this verbally in a meeting? If so, follow up in writing in your journal.

You are also entitled to a full statement of reasons which, from the images you posted, you have not yet had, so ask for this asap. This should shed some light on exactly what has gone wrong.

The good news about mandatory reconsideration is it gets looked at by a different decision maker. The bad news is there's no time limit for how long they get to reconsider. If the decision comes back the same you can appeal. It's worth seeking help at this stage, sometimes you can get free representation.

Not many decisions are overturned at the MR stage unless there's a glaringly obvious fault but from what you have written, your claim may fall into that category.

Meanwhile pay what you can towards your rent and keep your LL in the loop.

You can also go to prison for not paying council tax... but you'd only be liable from move in date. So you've done everything you need to. No reason why you should be punished.

I think MP and/or councilor could work wonders here

I've actually already tried to apply for a DHP and haven't heard a peep back dispite the site saying I'll hear back within 7 days.

I sent the DHP online form off on the 24th April as I already knew that the LHA wouldn't cover the entirety of the rent so I was trying to be proactive and having that in place for when my housing element of UC was sorted (as I had no idea of the shit storm I was about to encounter and thought the UC would be up and running within days)

There isn't a massive shortfall between the LHA and the rent but it's enough to make things a bit tight for a while until I'm back to work properly.

But yeah, I haven't heard back from them at all regarding the small top up I was asking for.

I'm going to get on the phone to the council tomorrow and go through a few things with them.

I requested the M.R on my journal. An advisor got back to me very quickly and said it had been put through. I then got another note on my journal from the service centre saying it had been escalated and a decision will be reached in 3 working days (as opposed to the longer time frame they gave me in the previous message which said they'd have until the 10th to reply)

I'm glad it goes to a different decision maker, that's encouraging.

I paid 1 months rent upfront which means I'm secure until the end of this month and I have just enough in my savings to pay for another month. Hopefully it'll be OK by then 🤞🤞🤞

You are all so helpful thank you so much

Ahh! How frustrating for you :(

I was fortunate that I was able to pay the rent so housing association didn’t receive any late payments.

im housing association but at intermediate rent so I would have been at risk of losing my home.

I would advise you to get a revised tenancy agreement from your landlord stating your tenancy and get council tax into your name as it may well give you a council tax bill online within a couple of days for you to use as supporting evidence

I hope you get it sorted

I'm going to read through everything now but just in case nobody has mentioned, look up uce (universal credit essentials) they will help you fix this!

Who deleted the proof?

Unfortunately it sounds like because you got landlord details wrong thats escalated it. We've had several from open rent and no problems whatsoever. All I can think of is try to get to citizens advice asap and they can help. You did check that university credit would help with housing etc before moving into this new place? Just remember they only pay a portion of the rent most times now and sometimes like happened my sister who forgot to check then moved and she didn't realise she would have to pay 3 quarters of the rent herself after moving out of an all paid flat. A lot depends on area and what council say you can have. Good luck hope you get fixed up.

I remember years ago trying to get the childcare element for my daughters nursery and that went back and forth for a few months because the stuff they wanted was sooooo nit picky , the invoices didn’t have a certain thing on like the dates wernt in a proper day/month/ year and the year was printed on the top of the invoice not in the box and the name wasn’t in full , the logo of nursery wasn’t clear enough. It was a faff , luckily the nursery manager ask everything I needed and made a new letter head and made it really over the top clear lol 😂

I also got overpaid once which was in 2018 and they sent an overpayment bill last year ?! To reclaim it. Was around £2,000! It frustrates me how they demand such info (fair enough) to figure out how much you’re entitled to but then they get it wrong, no apology like lol 😂

Somebody at universal credit, I don't understand why. They just deleted my files and left a full stop as feedback.

I did all the calculations beforehand yes. I'm entitled to the 3 bed LHA due to one of my children bring disabled and needing their own room. There is a £100 short fall in total but it isn't a dealbreaker because I can afford to pay that by tightening my belt a little if the council won't award a DHP. My child swith SN will be in school full time from September at which point I'll be back in work FTA and the top up won't be a problem.

Thank you I'll look now :)

Thank you, hopefully!

I made an error on the council tax form last night by putting march instead of april so I need to call them today to correct that. I may even go down there with my tenancy as I don't want anything else to go wrong 😐