Letter from fraud department, so stupid and scared

[Aldmi]

I got a letter from the councils fraud team yesterday saying they will be interviewing me under caution for fraud in relation to the self isolation £500 payment

I’m absolutely mortified, didn't sleep at all last night and keep throwing up with stress.

On the 17th of June, I received a message from my daughters after school care. That a member of staff had tested positive for Covid. And that they were closing the after-school care and notifying parents if their child had been a close contact.

They also told parents needed to come and collect their child asap.

Upon collection I was told by one of the workers who checked a list that my daughter was a close contact and would have to isolate.

A message was then posted through their messaging app confirming this.

I calculated this as her having to be off school until 25th June.

As a I am single parent with a court order in place as the resident parent. I must look after her as her mum has very little contact

I had heard of the £500 support and could apply for the support payment as I was staying at home with her and that I get universal credit with a child element. I applied for this the same night in a panic and included the requested documentation.

At the time I was very stressed, as my daughter kept constantly crying that she was going to get ill and be in hospital. Been away for work, due to be the only person in a busy department and very important appointment the next day. I also suffer from depression and anxiety which I am on medication for. I had presumed I would have a deduction from my salary.

Due to my ongoing anxiety and stress at work, by the time I was paid the next salary, I did not think to check the amount and had completely forgotten about the award. My salary had also changed over the previous months due to part time furlough.

I've spoken to a solicitor this morning, who says as its under caution I can get help from them for free. They are going to now contact the council to say I'm been represent and I will be doing the zoom meeting from their offices.

I feel so stupid and angry with myself for getting into this situation through nothing more then my on stupidity.

I work in a school, so if I am prosectured I will lose my job.

Has anyone heard of a case like this and what the likely outcome would be? going to court, prison etc

The interview isn't until next Friday and I can already feel to the point of a berakdown and its not even been 24 hours

Unless there's a lot more to this than you've mentioned that sounds pretty harsh to me, especially with the school - with the council, I'm still just amazed they've picked it up at all

All you can do is play it completely straight, tell the absolute truth and hope they'll focus instead on one of the many cases which will be much worse than yours

Bloody hell!

OP you might want to ask MN to move this to Legal now, given your latest update.

@Puzzledandpissedoff

Unless there's a lot more to this than you've mentioned that sounds pretty harsh to me, especially with the school - with the council, I'm still just amazed they've picked it up at all

All you can do is play it completely straight, tell the absolute truth and hope they'll focus instead on one of the many cases which will be much worse than yours

In terms of the school position, our head teacher is retiring and seems to be now settling old scores. Although unfortunately hard to prove that

Gosh that’s awful op , am shocked they are prosecuting for what is obviously a mistake. Have you arranged legal advice?

I am so sorry OP.
I can understand how it happened.
I can't understand why you aren't allowed to just pay it back?
Is the main issue because you are on UC they assume you would have known your income for that month?
Even so, it's still a bit rough, given how much of that is done in arrears.

That is so over the top.
How weird.

I wonder how they realised you had received it incorrectly etc. Did someone know and contact them to tell them?

Are you able to write to them and ask if you can come to some sort of agreement to pay it back without prosecuting etc?

Just chiming in with everyone else saying this seems so out of proportion! It reads like they think you'd been knowingly embezzling thousands upon thousands for months. I don't understand why they wouldn't just let you pay it back when you offered. I second maybe moving this thread/posting in Legal, I hope you can get some good advice and get this sorted.

@hoomama

That is so over the top. How weird.

I wonder how they realised you had received it incorrectly etc. Did someone know and contact them to tell them?

Are you able to write to them and ask if you can come to some sort of agreement to pay it back without prosecuting etc?

They crossed referenced with my other through HMRC

When I mentioned it to work the other day. It was the first they had had of it

I don't understand how they could say you failed to work during the isolation if you weren't able to do your job from home, equally I don't understand why the school paid you if you were not at work, which they were clearly aware of. Do you not have to submit any self certificates for isolation periods?

It’s worth writing to your MP to see if they can help at all - you can find your MP here members.parliament.uk/FindYourMP

It’s worth writing to your MP to see if they can help at all - you can find your MP here members.parliament.uk/FindYourMP

Crikey. Can I presume you are a single dad OP? I'm going on your previous posts.

If so, then I'm wondering if they presume you share custody? Or even worse, that you're a father who has their child every other weekend. In which case I could understand their position a bit more.

If not and they're fully aware, then this is disgraceful and you need to contact the CAB as soon as possible

Are you in a trade union? If you are already a trade union member they may be able to offer advice if you get into trouble over this at work, and unions have schemes for legal advice etc.

You won't be the only one who has made mistakes over this.

Councils are coming under pressure from the government to tackle possible fraud cases and recover overpayments too (unfortunately, it's a bit of a political football).

I see that you are now suspended and facing disciplinary action at work, so if you're in a union, you should definitely contact them.

Also, are there doctors/other professionals who've seen you in regard to your mental health? Has Social Services been involved with your daughter/family matters or your mental health?

I think you need support and advice from organisations who deal with cases in this area.

Is there an opportunity for you to appeal? That is bloody harsh. I won't bore you with the details of my involvement with them but I pay an amount back every week.

have you spoken to the solicitor? I would ask for this to be moved to legal matters

Please please get proper legal advice.

Please also ask for this thread to be moved to legal, you are getting really dangerous advice here.

our head teacher is retiring and seems to be now settling old scores

I don't know what this means, and it's none of my business anyway - but while I agree about getting proper legal advice, you might want to remember that they'll need full disclosure in order to help you properly

It will probably cost them more than £500 to go to court anyway

I agree that some of the responses here aren't that helpful - I understand wanting to be reassuring, but how can you reassure someone when you don't really know what has happened, the context etc. It's become very clear across the public sector that the government, some councils, senior management teams etc want to pretend that we can return to "normal", whatever that is, and a high profile crackdown on so-called fraud very much takes place in a political context. This is not to say that fraud doesn't happen, but that all sorts of things can get caught up.

I think that if a union member someone should go to the union first for several reasons

1. There are quite a number of issues here, and OP needs advice on both fraud and employment matters to start with, but not necessarily the same person/people.

1. On employment issues, local union branches and representatives actually know the employers/organisations involved, the procedures etc

1. Most unions also have arrangements for members to have access to some legal advice on matters beyond employment. This won't necessarily cover defending a whole prosecution case but might help even to get initial advicec on the separate issues.

@elkiedee

I agree that some of the responses here aren't that helpful - I understand wanting to be reassuring, but how can you reassure someone when you don't really know what has happened, the context etc. It's become very clear across the public sector that the government, some councils, senior management teams etc want to pretend that we can return to "normal", whatever that is, and a high profile crackdown on so-called fraud very much takes place in a political context. This is not to say that fraud doesn't happen, but that all sorts of things can get caught up.

I think that if a union member someone should go to the union first for several reasons

1. There are quite a number of issues here, and OP needs advice on both fraud and employment matters to start with, but not necessarily the same person/people.

1. On employment issues, local union branches and representatives actually know the employers/organisations involved, the procedures etc

1. Most unions also have arrangements for members to have access to some legal advice on matters beyond employment. This won't necessarily cover defending a whole prosecution case but might help even to get initial advicec on the separate issues.

This is good advice

The biggest problem you have here is convincing a judge you didn't notice an extra £500 in your account. Not many people forget £500. You also need to bear in mind the repayments structure may not allow for simply repaying. They may only have prosecution available as a means of recovery. These are new funds which were rushed through and may not be subject to the same additional legislation as other types of social fund which allow for simple out of court means to repay an overpayment.

This seems really over the top. Why on earth are they proceeding when you've offered to pay back the £500? And why are they doing this for £500? They'll spend way more than that just getting it to court, surely!

"I received a letter yesterday to say after reviewing my case. They have taken the decision to proceed with a prosecution.
Double whammy that I've informed my employer and they are now also launching a disciplinary investigation for:

1. failing to work during the isolation
2. bringing the school into disrupt following the 'fraud'"

This is difficult for you. The fact it was not clear if you would be paid when off is worth looking into. Eg some employment contracts wil make that clear and others not. You might find something useful also in emails from the school from during the pandemic eg if they said if you take time off we will not pay you.

Here you assumed you would not be paid without checking, applied for the £500 on the basis you would be losing that amount of money from pay and when you were later paid had already claimed the £500. You apparently tried to pay it back but were unable to do so.

If you have a union rep contact them about the employment situation or self employed situation. Check if your house insurance has any legal cover too.
Check if the school are right that they had expected you to keep working at home whilst isolating and you did not or if it was clear they would pay you not to work from home when isolating.

"Fraud and error from a loan scheme to help businesses cope with the COVID-19 pandemic could cost the British taxpayer up to 27 billion pounds ($37 billion), on top of some 50 billion pounds a year lost to criminals and mistakes", (Reuters June 2021)

Do not worry - things usually work out okay in the end. Make clear time lines and put together a bundle of papers - the time line should set out what happened when and who said what when and the attachments in date order should be things liike extracts from emails from the school, your employment contract, copies of your covid claim, when and how you tried to pay the sum back once you realised you had been paid by the school plus the state etc

Our children will be paying through their tax for a generation for the financial covid support to those people lucky enough to get it so I am certainly not against prosecutions but they must only be where people have clearly broken the law or chosen not to read the words of the loan's rules.

HarrisonStickle as said before, I expect there's a lot more to this which OP has (perhaps understandably) not disclosed

We can't know about the council thing, but there's already been mention of the headteacher "settling old scores" - all of which is why I said a proper lawyer will need full disclosure in order to help properly