UC Depreciation of capital

[beserene]

Has anyone had this? When I started claiming UC during COVID, I had about £6k in savings. Over time, I’ve not only had to use this to live on, but I’ve also had to get several loans to cover car repairs (I can’t get to work without a car), DC costs, clear credit cards and most recently general cost of living.

I had a review and I was told that since my capital has gone down, it could well be that UC owe me. They said my situation is more complicated than others, but that I should look into this.

i was wondering if anyone else had experienced thus? I’ve gone from poor to very poor, hopefully about to changed again, but I wasn’t aware of UC underpaying.

Did you have more than £6000

Can you obtain bank statements going back five years to show the balance in your account during the period of your claim? I know UC is nearly all online but you should be able to make an appt to hand these into a benefit office so they can reconsider your claim. £6000 is the very minimum capital you can have and still be fully eligible (you can claim some UC, with deductions, up to £16K) so if it dropped below £6K for a long period of time I'd say you would be due a refund!

They don't owe you money if you only ever had 6k because they only deduct money from your monthly UC award if you have savings over 6k.

Never

He said it’s possible that I have been receiving wrong levels of UC because the £6k soon became 0 over those years. I’ve literally been living hand to mouth on my earnings & UC over those years.

Yes I have pretty much all my statements.
Well that is how he made it sound. Could that be right?

I haven’t been able to save anything and have been living hand to mouth off my earnings and UC. I have had a very simple life alone, I used up the £6k ages ago and got a loan to tide me over - which I’ve been paying back consistently in small monthly sums, so all accounts are straightforward but it would still be a pain. Could it really be that way? I just want to get off UC ASAP, went on it when my work became inconsistent.

Have you been having a notional capital deduction each month based on 6k savings. It will be on your statement.

If not then nothing will be owed. Even if it is on there then you are supposed to report a decrease in capital within 1 month to have the deduction removed. A decision maker may go back longer but they don’t have to and will be looking to understand why you didn’t report the change sooner.

If you've never had over 6k then you won't have had any deductions and nothing will be owed.

You don't get more UC between 0-6k savings, just deductions for every £250 or part thereof between 6k and 16k.

Have you ever had deductions for capital listed on your statement? If not then there's nothing to be paid back.

If you have only ever had £6000 or less for the lifetime of your UC claim then there will be no underpaid UC owed to you. If however, you had for example £12000 at the start of your claim but now it’s dropped to below £6000 then your entitlement will change. As they would have deducted £4.35 for every £250 over the £6000. So £104.40 less Uc if you had £12k

I don’t know if UC would retrospectively look at your claim in situations like that as imagine they would say it was your responsibility to notify them of changes via your online account.

NB- please check above as I work in housing benefits for a local government officer, but the basics are the same re capital though, in that the first £6000 of someone’s capital is fully disregarded

If it never went over 6k you will not have been receiving wrong levels. the only way you could have been overpaid is if say you reported you had 10k and it were having some deductions for the savings over 6k and then it went below 6k and they were still deducting for the savings over 6k because you hadn't told them of the drop in savings. However it does not sound like this was the case. If it was a UC helpline person who told you this then tbh they aren't really very well trained. I'm sorry you struggled but it doesn't mean you have been underpaid.

He thinks I was underpaid because it went from £6k to nothing.

And as everyone on here is telling you he is wrong. We have all tried to explain how UC works in relation to savings. Speak to Citizens advice if you need further reassurance as they have expert teams who deal with UC.

But you don’t lose any of the UC until
you have over £6k in savings so how could
you have not been paid enough?

Thank you for clarifying this. It seems odd to me that they would open a retrospective claim like this. No, it’s not that I had >6k, it’s that I had 6k to start, and it diminished. Maybe he wasn’t clear, he said he’d have to speak to an advisor & that my case is complicated for him so it is possible that he’s wrong.

i thought that, now. Maybe it was my responsibility to say I ran out of cash but I didn’t know that and also they did see my dwindling earnings at one stage in the year (more than once) and didn’t say anything. What’s done is done. I’m just happy to get off UC if I can.

I don’t know. He just said that my UC was based on 6k capital and as that diminished fast I might have received incorrect payments. I can’t imagine they’d really give me the difference.

You do not have to report that you ran out of cash. You just have to report any savings over 6k which you never had so it's not a problem. It doesn't sound like you have done anything wrong in relation to your claim.

Good! That’s fine. I don’t have a problem with what everyone is telling me. I’m just answering my replies one by one.

It was someone reviewing my case. I didn’t think I ever was received anything wrong. He just mentioned it today and I’m asking if anyone else has had this. As far as I’m concerned, what’s done is done & I’ve been fortunate enough to be coming off it soon (I hope). I want to know, though, how much effort to put into delivering bank statements from potentially 5 years ago, if what he says is true. Thanks for help, Harriet9955!

They dont deduct for anything between £0-£6,000 so if anything itll be a few quid they owe you if anything.

Yes that’s what the guy told me - he thinks they might owe me. I’m not sure I can be bothered to pursue it. I survived those years and have slowly been getting in a better place. Thanks!

No if you never had/can't prove anything over £6K there would be no deductions made. The advisor is wrong then. Christ and they're meant to be the experts!

Unless of course whoever initially assessed your claim got it wrong and made unjustified deductions, in which case you would see them on the breakdown of payments on your statements.

It is under rather than over! Weird. Yes, you’d think they would have got it right. I never saw breakdowns of anything on my statements, but maybe that’s because it was under rather than over? It never occurred to me to tell them that it was under. Ah well. As far as I’m concerned, what’s done is done. What’s the point now? I got through that time.