Earlier in 2022, the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) located approximately 22,500 Housing Benefits claimants impacted by the Employment and Support Allowance (ESA) underpayment and Incapacity Benefit (IB) reassessment corrective program.
As reported by the Daily Record, this exercise has seen local authorities check if arrears were due for claimants from 2011 to 2019. The DWP stated in August that after the exercise was completed in March, additional cases were identified that saw claimants have their Income Related ESA award reassessed.
This week, Welsh MP Ben Lake questioned whether the DWP has reached out to every claimant that qualified for compensation. DWP Parliamentary Under-Secretary Claire Coutinho MP answered: “As part of the IB to ESA reassessment LEAP exercise the Department reviewed around 600,000 cases and made 118,000 arrears payments amounting to over £600m.”
