Can DWP claim an overpayment from an estate when there is only a house

[Openlaw15]

Re: Can DWP claim an overpayment from an estate when there is only a house

Read the OP's post openlaw!!

nem

Nem, how about you state your point rather than I guess the point you're thinking of.

[nemesis45]

Re: Can DWP claim an overpayment from an estate when there is only a house

Nem, how about you state your point rather than I guess the point you're thinking of.

If you do as suggested you will see why the OP does not want anymore to do with this matter!

[Openlaw15]

Re: Can DWP claim an overpayment from an estate when there is only a house

Sorry this is very long, but it is complex.

My mother died in Scotland at the start of this year and had been in a nursing home for the 5 years before her death. She was entitled to have her nursing care paid because of her physical and mental condition but her accommodation costs all had to be paid. That is how it works in Scotland, Nursing Home fees are NOT Free in Scotland at all as some people in England seem to think.

She had very little in saving approx 2k but she did own her small house, therefore she was not entitled to have her fees paid as the house is counted as capital. The house would have to be sold or I would have to pay towards her fees, which I chose to do and so she was regarded as being self funding. I contacted DWP when I started looking for a place for her in a home explaining the situation and to find out what she was entitled to in benefits and pension. They were less than helpful and would not discuss with me because it was my mother's account and they insisted they speak to her. That very quickly made them realise this was pointless as she could not understand the conversation. I was then told that they could not discuss the amount of any of her benefits or pension with me, but what they could tell me (to enable me to work out how much I would need to contribute to her fees) was that because she was self funding she was entitled to continue to receive her current income from DWP. This as far as I know was her state pension, pension credit, mobility and I think attendance allowance. But it was all paid as one amount into her account every four weeks and as they would not tell me how it was made up it was really hard to be sure of what she was receiving other than the total amount.

However I took them at their word in good faith and found a place for her, most of my monthly salary for 5 years then went towards her fees and in total between her pension and benefits and my contribution there has been over 120k paid to the nursing home for her accommodation. Now DWP are saying she has been overpaid, I don't have a final figure yet but I cannot understand how she can possibly have been over paid when there was nothing in her bank and everything she had coming in went to pay her fees, including my salary for 5 years. As a family we have really struggled to meet this commitment and I am only beginning to catch up with my own debts such as credit cards to buy food while I was paying her fees. Now I am being told I could owe DWP around 30k or more and should sell the house to pay for it??

Members of our family with a disabled child live in the house, my mother before she lost her mental capacity, very specifically wanted them to have her house as it was already adapted for disability and they desperately needed suitable accommodation. The house was to be transferred to me when she died, but they would live there and pay rent. During the 5 years they contributed towards her fees in place of rent. This was how as a family we decided to manage her care rather than have to sell the house. Had we done that the govenment would have had to pay her fees when they money from the house ran out anyway, so infact we saved them a lot of money. We also provided a home for a family who were in urgent need, something the council were unable to do as they had no accommodation available and the family were living in a upper floor flat which made their life impossible.

What I cannot undertand is how after having paid out all this money to care for my mother and her having no savings I am now being asked to pay out again. It does not help that my mother who thought she was Lady Bountiful also left large legacies, which I am also having to pay. There is still the house, but I am not prepared to put a disabled child and family out of their home just because DWP suddenly decided that they have overpaid benefits.

I expect I will have to pay whatever it eventually comes to, although I will never in a million years believe their calculations, they specifically told me she was entitled to continue to receive her current benefits. But can they force the sale of the house to get immediate repayment or can I insist they agree a repayment schedule directly with me. It is more of a problem because I am not the executor, this is one of my mothers fairweather friends hanging in there because of the legacy!! Not around for the 5 years of fees of course. But to discharge the executors I need to accept liability for any DWP repayment no matter how large. I will not put a family out of their home, I will do anything within my power to stop that happening even if it means I need to work until I drop dead which as I am already past retirement age means I probably will. Does anyone know if I can refuse to allow the sale of the house to pay DWP and insist they accept payments I can afford?

This is illegal in the civil sense so in my view DWP abused their powers. Alternatively there was no overpayment as DWP agree to the payments continuing. It's a shame I wasn't here in Dec 2014 as the advice given to OP was not good. Didn't any of you think, they had permission to keep the payments on-going that it would be a red flag?? To be fair though, if you don't understand law in this type of situation it's easy to over-look.

[Openlaw15]

Re: Can DWP claim an overpayment from an estate when there is only a house

If you do as suggested you will see why the OP does not want anymore to do with this matter!

Their children or friends could help them write the letter to the Parl. Ombudsman if the Op is not able to.

[wales01man]

Re: Can DWP claim an overpayment from an estate when there is only a house

YAWN!

[nemesis45]

Re: Can DWP claim an overpayment from an estate when there is only a house

YAWN!

unsubscribing!

[enaid]

Re: Can DWP claim an overpayment from an estate when there is only a house

Really think the OP has had enough stress over this, not forgetting a solicitor was involved in all this as well,regardless of her not getting 'good advice ' in 2014.
It is also in Scotland where rules are slightly different as well.

[Openlaw15]

Re: Can DWP claim an overpayment from an estate when there is only a house

Really think the OP has had enough stress over this, not forgetting a solicitor was involved in all this as well,regardless of her not getting 'good advice ' in 2014.
It is also in Scotland where rules are slightly different as well.

I know Enaid it's just frustrating to know of a potential remedy alas too late in the day, as it were. I don't blame any one at all per se...it's complex but hopefully, we can help someone in this similar scenario next time.

[enaid]

Re: Can DWP claim an overpayment from an estate when there is only a house

The whole issue with the elderly is frustrating believe me, been there and worn quite a few T shirts too. IMHO the solicitor should have done a lot more than he did, but as we finding out on issues like this and other things some will do as little as possible for the highest cost. Also he was not forthcoming as he may have been as he was dealing with the executor and maybe they were not up to the task.

[Openlaw15]

Re: Can DWP claim an overpayment from an estate when there is only a house

The whole issue with the elderly is frustrating believe me, been there and worn quite a few T shirts too. IMHO the solicitor should have done a lot more than he did, but as we finding out on issues like this and other things some will do as little as possible for the highest cost. Also he was not forthcoming as he may have been as he was dealing with the executor and maybe they were not up to the task.

Very true and very sad, it's easy to exploit the vulnerable this is why we have the Equality Act 2010 to protect older people. In theory anyway, I should add.

[iona]

Re: Can DWP claim an overpayment from an estate when there is only a house

I can't thank you enough for updating us on this matter, I am though totally devastated at the way things have turned out for you and yours.
The DWP have a job to do, how they go about it though sometimes is beyond belief.
The do gooders who try to get all the benefits for the elderly are correct in what they do, sadly the elderly do not always own up to what they already have albeit intentionally or not. The 4 benefits you mentioned AA, mobility component and state pension are all allowed when you are self funding, the only one that could have been overpaid was pension credit, this can also be claimed if you fit the criteria.
If and when the money gets to a certain level (23k) or so now then reassessment should come in and as the money dwindles then the less you pay towards your care.
If a time came when your mum was LA funded then all those benefits should have either stopped or gone to the LA towards the funding.
Anyway I am waffling on and as we have just done exactly the same and placed MIL in a care home I have had to look at ways and means of sorting out the funding without losing her house. We are renting it out and with her benefits will just about cover the cost.

I do wish you a long, happy and healthy retirement when its happens and you are so right, get your will and LPAs sorted while you are able.
Good Luck and once again thanks for the update.
Enaid x

Thank you very much. When I was in the middle of all the struggle to get this resolved there were many times when I wondered why I was working so hard to keep the house. Then I would remember the lives it was providing for my family who so desperately needed it and that kept me going through it all. We lost my in laws house to nursing home fees and we were determined we would not let it happen again, not when we had family for whom that house made all the difference in the world. I wish you well with the dreaded monthly fees, I am now working out just how much longer I have to work to make retirement a possibility and it feels like a very long time away yet, some day I will be able to turn off the alarm clock and it's not going back on again unless it's really essential.

[iona]

Re: Can DWP claim an overpayment from an estate when there is only a house

This is illegal in the civil sense so in my view DWP abused their powers. Alternatively there was no overpayment as DWP agree to the payments continuing. It's a shame I wasn't here in Dec 2014 as the advice given to OP was not good. Didn't any of you think, they had permission to keep the payments on-going that it would be a red flag?? To be fair though, if you don't understand law in this type of situation it's easy to over-look.

It is happening to families all over the place. I have heard of several others who are faced with the same nightmare. One of the things that contributed greatly to all this in the first place was something you may recall happening when the Labour Government was in power. We were for ever being told that there were large numbers of elderly people not claiming all the benefits they were entitled to and that millions were going unclaimed. As I am sure you know it's a very different story now, everyone who is elderly or on benefits has become a scrounger according to the current mob in Westminster.

However back in the days when there were all these millions in unclaimed benefits, (wherever did they vanish to I wonder) there was a government initiative to sort this out. So armies of DWP employees were sent out to assist those not claiming their full entitlement. Great idea, but had some flaws.

My mother was one of these people who received a visit on the death of my father, they had not been claiming all they were entitled to and she was told she did not have enough to live on. So her pension credit was sorted out and along with many others she received a bit more. However the reality was that these people were elderly often frail and didn't go out much. They were used to living on a very small income and large numbers of them just continued to live the same way. They didn't want to go out and spend money; to them living frugally was a way of life. So that extra money they received built up in their accounts and some exceeded the savings limit allowed.

Many didn't turn uptheir heating that would waste money; they just went to bed with a hot water bottle if it was cold. But they absolutely did not in any way deliberately defraud the DWP; they were not even capable of doing so. They simply had very little idea how much was in their accounts, or if they did then it didn't mean a great deal to them. Getting through each day, with failing health and memories that did not retain information about anything much at all, other than where they had put their tea bags, meant they had no idea they were over the savings limit. Most of them didn't understand what the limit was anyway and it changed over time, so they couldn't remember what they had been told about it.

As it happened my mother was only slightly over the limit for an odd month here and there as she did some costly repairs to her house. She also spent a lot on her heating and her phone bills were similar to the debt of a small country. She had a tendency to call the second I arrived home from work, or as soon as I started to make dinner. I became convinced she had set an alarm reminder to let her know when I would arrive home. It was all to tell me the same things endlessly.

She did spend a lot of the money she received. It was the money they were paying her while she was in the nursing home, that they considered to have been over paid.

However the present government arrived on the scene and discovered that there were pensioners who had been on benefits dying and leaving money to their descendants. Well that was a red rag to a bull that could not be allowed at all. All these 90 year olds with dementia had been defrauding the state by allowing money they didn't even know they had to build up in their bank accounts. So the MP’s were rubbing their hands with glee at the thought of all this money sitting there in banks unused. They immediately did what governments do; they set up a department to recover all this money. They called it the NFI (National Fraud Initiative) they now pick their way through the bones of almost every estate of the deceased in the UK and claw back every penny they imagine these old people kept that they were not entitled to. In fact they were entitled to every penny of it that had already been fully and accurately assessed by the DWP. What went wrong was that many of them just didn't spend it.

The thing that I have found most insulting about all this is that they treat it as if it is fraud. 99.99% of these old people never committed a criminal act in their entire lives; all they did was grow old. They had reached an age where they had little or no interest in what money could buy and they were forgetful. But that has been treated as if it was a criminal offence by this government. For that I detest and despise them, their departments and the DWP. I fully understand that people should not have public money they are not entitled to, but that is not the case with these old people. I think the very least they could do is give this department a less offensive name and treat the dead with more respect. That generation fought wars for this country and many suffered dreadfully, their young lives spent facing war every day for 5 plus years. My father as a soldier and my mother as a nurse. It affected their whole lives and looking back now I realise just how damaged they were by it. They should most certainly not be accused of something they have not actually done when they reach the end of their lives.

[iona]

Re: Can DWP claim an overpayment from an estate when there is only a house

I am so sorry for your situation. May I ask have you paid all of the virtually 30k to DWP in full? Did they have a right to that 30k? For instance, 1) DWP have to prove there has been an overpayment. 2) The overpayment must not be DWP claimant's fault. So an overpayment by claimant here would include failure to inform of a change in circumstance. If it was DWP's fault in part you could have challenged either part or all of the overpayment. It may alternatively have been fraud. 3) DWP, by law, has to prove you were overpaid to the exact detail and you had the right to request a break-down. However, no matter what DWP did not have the power to force you to sell the mother's family home and would have had to make a claim to local court like other alleged debtors. Alternatively, depending how bad your mother's health was and the time or at any point during her incapacity or when an LPA was appointed, she could have successfully argued she did not have capacity (mental functioning to deal with her personal affairs, ie money, assets) when the alleged overpayments were made.

I personally was not happy with the way it was managed but I was not the executor. I did ask for it to be proved and was eventually told that the solicitor and the executors were satisfied that the money was due to DWP. I have never been given that proof but yes I paid them every penny and I did so because I didn't want the house to be sold therefore I really had no alternative. My mother certainly did not have the mental capacity to notify DWP of anything. Also I have a letter they sent out after I notified them that she had dementia. It is one of their usual sort of letters starting 'now that your circumstances have changed' then it said 'you no longer need to notify us of any future changes in your circumstances'. I sent a copy of this to the solicitor and she did use it when appealing. But DWP dismissed it and refused to accept that it was proof they had been told by me on the phone what her circumstances were. There was no other reason for them to send that letter as my mother had not notified them of anything herself, she was completely incapable of contacting them.

[iona]

Re: Can DWP claim an overpayment from an estate when there is only a house

I can't thank you enough for updating us on this matter, I am though totally devastated at the way things have turned out for you and yours.
The DWP have a job to do, how they go about it though sometimes is beyond belief.
The do gooders who try to get all the benefits for the elderly are correct in what they do, sadly the elderly do not always own up to what they already have albeit intentionally or not. The 4 benefits you mentioned AA, mobility component and state pension are all allowed when you are self funding, the only one that could have been overpaid was pension credit, this can also be claimed if you fit the criteria.
If and when the money gets to a certain level (23k) or so now then reassessment should come in and as the money dwindles then the less you pay towards your care.
If a time came when your mum was LA funded then all those benefits should have either stopped or gone to the LA towards the funding.
Anyway I am waffling on and as we have just done exactly the same and placed MIL in a care home I have had to look at ways and means of sorting out the funding without losing her house. We are renting it out and with her benefits will just about cover the cost.

I do wish you a long, happy and healthy retirement when its happens and you are so right, get your will and LPAs sorted while you are able.
Good Luck and once again thanks for the update.
Enaid x

Many thanks.

[Openlaw15]

Re: Can DWP claim an overpayment from an estate when there is only a house

It is happening to families all over the place. I have heard of several others who are faced with the same nightmare. One of the things that contributed greatly to all this in the first place was something you may recall happening when the Labour Government was in power. We were for ever being told that there were large numbers of elderly people not claiming all the benefits they were entitled to and that millions were going unclaimed. As I am sure you know it's a very different story now, everyone who is elderly or on benefits has become a scrounger according to the current mob in Westminster.

However back in the days when there were all these millions in unclaimed benefits, (wherever did they vanish to I wonder) there was a government initiative to sort this out. So armies of DWP employees were sent out to assist those not claiming their full entitlement. Great idea, but had some flaws.

My mother was one of these people who received a visit on the death of my father, they had not been claiming all they were entitled to and she was told she did not have enough to live on. So her pension credit was sorted out and along with many others she received a bit more. However the reality was that these people were elderly often frail and didn't go out much. They were used to living on a very small income and large numbers of them just continued to live the same way. They didn't want to go out and spend money; to them living frugally was a way of life. So that extra money they received built up in their accounts and some exceeded the savings limit allowed.

Many didn't turn uptheir heating that would waste money; they just went to bed with a hot water bottle if it was cold. But they absolutely did not in any way deliberately defraud the DWP; they were not even capable of doing so. They simply had very little idea how much was in their accounts, or if they did then it didn't mean a great deal to them. Getting through each day, with failing health and memories that did not retain information about anything much at all, other than where they had put their tea bags, meant they had no idea they were over the savings limit. Most of them didn't understand what the limit was anyway and it changed over time, so they couldn't remember what they had been told about it.

As it happened my mother was only slightly over the limit for an odd month here and there as she did some costly repairs to her house. She also spent a lot on her heating and her phone bills were similar to the debt of a small country. She had a tendency to call the second I arrived home from work, or as soon as I started to make dinner. I became convinced she had set an alarm reminder to let her know when I would arrive home. It was all to tell me the same things endlessly.

She did spend a lot of the money she received. It was the money they were paying her while she was in the nursing home, that they considered to have been over paid.

However the present government arrived on the scene and discovered that there were pensioners who had been on benefits dying and leaving money to their descendants. Well that was a red rag to a bull that could not be allowed at all. All these 90 year olds with dementia had been defrauding the state by allowing money they didn't even know they had to build up in their bank accounts. So the MP’s were rubbing their hands with glee at the thought of all this money sitting there in banks unused. They immediately did what governments do; they set up a department to recover all this money. They called it the NFI (National Fraud Initiative) they now pick their way through the bones of almost every estate of the deceased in the UK and claw back every penny they imagine these old people kept that they were not entitled to. In fact they were entitled to every penny of it that had already been fully and accurately assessed by the DWP. What went wrong was that many of them just didn't spend it.

The thing that I have found most insulting about all this is that they treat it as if it is fraud. 99.99% of these old people never committed a criminal act in their entire lives; all they did was grow old. They had reached an age were they had little or no interest in what money could buy and they were forgetful. But that has been treated as if it was a criminal offence by this government. For that I detest and despise them, their departments and the DWP. I fully understand that people should not have public money they are not entitled to, but that is not the case with these old people. I think the very least they could do is give this department a less offensive name and treat the dead with more respect. That generation fought wars for this country and many suffered dreadfully, their young lives spent facing war every day for 5 plus years. My father as a soldier and my mother as a nurse. It affected their whole lives and looking back now I realise just how damaged they were by it. They should most certainly not be accused of something they have not actually done when they reach the end of their lives.

This is Tory by design. Tory = cut all state benefits; claim back all overpayment benefits. The Tories did it to manipulate 1925 debtor claims to their favour. Tory Gov. - 1979-1997. Labour got in power, 1997. Tories are experts on cutting public money or claiming it back. If the solicitor had read DWP overpayment law they'd have known there were grounds in your mother's case (claim against her estate) to cancel the investigations, notwithstanding your mother didn't even have capacity (through dementia) and at the point they realised this, informed you what they did. I am not even a legal professional never mind a solicitor or barrister and I am aware of the relevant laws. Technically, the legal ombudsman could investigate your crap solicitor and the Parliament Ombudsman could investigate the actions of DWP.