Social Security Benefits: Overpayments

(asked on 19th November 2024) - View Source
Questioner
Rupert Lowe Portrait
Rupert Lowe
(Reform UK - Great Yarmouth)

Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what overpayments of benefits due to Departmental error there were in each of the last five financial years.

Answered by
Andrew Western Portrait
Andrew Western
Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Work and Pensions)
This question was answered on 27th November 2024

The Department publishes estimates of the levels of fraud and error in the benefit system by financial year. These statistics for the last five years are available at: Fraud and error in the benefit system - GOV.UK

Below is an extract:

OVERALL LEVELS OF MVFE

FYE 24

FYE 23

FYE 22

FYE21

FYE 20

All

3.7%  (£9.7bn)

3.6%  (£8.3bn)

4.0%  (£8.7bn)

3.9%  (£8.2bn)

2.4%  (£4.5bn)

Fraud

2.8%  (£7.4bn)

2.7%  (£6.3bn)

3.0%  (£6.5bn)

2.9%  (£6.2bn)

1.4%  (£2.7bn)

Claimant Error

0.6%  (£1.6bn)

0.6%  (£1.4bn)

0.7%  (£1.5bn)

0.6%  (£1.3bn)

0.6%  (£1.1bn)

Official Error

0.3%  (£0.8bn)

0.3%  (£0.7bn)

0.3%  (£0.7bn)

0.4%  (£0.8bn)

0.4%  (£0.7bn)

Reticulating Splines