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Anyone who was overpaid after ESA increase in April - Check your deductions!!

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23 hours 27 minutes ago #315765 by Anna
I know many in here faced the same thing as myself - a random deduction around April/May for ESA - instead of £609.05, a lower amount deducted.

I had around £280ish deducted so was aware a repayment would eventually need to be made. I received a letter in July detailing this (I never called or wrote in my journal as I have been incorrectly penalised by DWP in the past for flagging their errors, and I saw that enough people had experienced this to know that it was a widespread error and not just me) and it stated how much I had been overpaid by.

According to my calculations, regardless of how much ESA you actually received during that month, they still only deducted the old £609.05 for the entire assessment period, so if your assessment period timing means that even if you received 1 day at the old rate and 29 days at the new rate, you'll technically receive more money that month.

However, my statement with the incorrect deduction also had a random "debt" deduction of around £60, which I assumed was part of the error. When they updated my statement to the correct deductions of £609.06, the deduction was still included on my statement, and because each subsequent deduction on my statements were around £63, I assumed they'd left the "error" deduction and counted it towards my repayments.

I worked out how much my deductions should be each month and kept a running total. This months statement just arrive, and I should only have about £13 left to pay back, but instead they've continued to deduct £63.

It appears that the error deduction they left on my incorrect statement from April, was deducted but not included in the repayment calculation, thus now underpaying me by £60!

I've just left a message in journal with all the calculations, and I'm sure they will take another 6 months to get back to me like last time, but in the meantime, I wanted to give others a heads-up as I suspect they have likely done this with many people, and are banking on people forgetting the total/trusting them to calculate the deductions correctly, since it has already been almost 6 months.

Has anyone else noticed this?

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1 hour 16 minutes ago #315772 by David
Hi Anna

Thank you for your observation which will be useful to other Forum members who I expect have experienced the same situation.

David

Nothing on this board constitutes legal advice - always consult a professional about specific problems

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