Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, if he will bring forward the introduction of the online booking system for universal credit jobcentre appointments so that new claimants in October do not incur costs for calling the helpline.

DWP is currently running a tender process to identify a strategic appointment booking provider. In accordance with the minimum timescales set out in the Public Contracts Regulations 2015 we expect to complete this process in January 2018.

Once a strategic appointment booking provider is identified, we will need to undertake further work to build the required functionality to link the booking system to the Universal Credit Full Service.