What is "The Benefits Financial Matching Service"

A local regional newspaper mentions something it calls "The Benefits Matching Service"
in relation to a closed fraud case.
Apparently this computer service detects interest payments of known Claimants'accounts
and calculates if the capital sum exceeds mean testing.
Ive never heard of this have you?
Is it National of just certain pilot LAs

Gordon,

I agree with all you say. However, having worked with the DWP Fraud Team during my training and working as a DLA Tribunal member, the Fraud Team agree that fraud for sickness/disaabilitybenefits is less than 0.5 %.

The majority of fraud is committed for those who receive Council Tax Benefit and Housing Benefit, the latter of which is committed by landlords of privately rented accommodation who submit fraudulent claims for non existent tenants.

Of course the DWP never release a definitive breakdown of fraudulent claims, they leave it to the gutter press e.g. the Daily Mail who's stories are often inaccurate, biased and out of date.

Jim

Hallo,Co incidentally I too was briefly seconded at one time in the early 1980s to a DHSS "Fraud Invesigator"when I worked as an Excecutive Officer in Brixton Local Office.I remember early morning trips to Brixton Council Estates where the Officer tried knocking on doors and quizzing neighbours to try to find out if someone was at work.We never got much luck.
The Matching Service exists then.
As Gordon adds it may rather limited as I dont see how throwing up a list of names only can be greatly useful.
There must be many people of similiar names in an area like a phone book?
In order to probe further like DOB,etc isnt it necessary to obtain a Court Financial Disclosure Order which are lengthy and costly?
Also since it relies on Inland Revenue Data what of accounts that are non interest bearing as so many Current and Cash Accounts are nowadays?
No tax is paid on these millions of accounts as there is no interest paid on any of them.......?

Gordon wrote:

James wrote: A local regional newspaper mentions something it calls "The Benefits Matching Service"
in relation to a closed fraud case.
Apparently this computer service detects interest payments of known Claimants'accounts
and calculates if the capital sum exceeds mean testing.
Ive never heard of this have you?
Is it National of just certain pilot LAs

It is not particularly new, basically all banks, etc. are required to notify the government of interest paid on accounts as part of the tax system, all that happens is that these details are matched against a list of benefit recipients and where there is a match, and it falls outside of acceptable limits, then it is flagged to the relevant agency, the DWP or a Local Authority, for investigation.

I do not know how sophisticated the system is, whether it looks at single accounts or multiple ones, whether different interest rates are taken into account and what the cut off points are, but there have been numerous examples of claimants defrauding the system who have been caught out by these checks.

Gordon

The system is anything but sophisticated. A few years ago, I received a letter from the DWP asking me to attend an interview with a compliance officer at JC+. I insisted upon knowing why before the date. It was suggested that in a previous financial year I had approximately twice the capital I had. This would have reduced my entitlement to mean-tested benefits by a few pounds per weeks. I had two interviews, submitting all my financial data. What happened appears obvious. In the financial year in question I had moved my puny capital, putting it into a new account. Hence the figure was doubled. DWP never acknowledged fault.

MW