Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what proportion of those applying for a Short Term Benefit Advance (STBA) in 2014–15 were rejected because (1) they were not considered likely to be entitled to the benefit for which they required an STBA, (2) they were not considered to be in sufficient financial need to warrant an STBA, (3) they were not expected to be able to repay the loan arising from an STBA, (4) a benefit payment could be made in a timeframe that negated the need for an STBA, or (5) for other reasons.

There is no data available to answer questions 1, 2, 3 & 5. Please see table below in response to question 4;

For context we have also provided STBA Applications Received.

The data provided is for Employment and Support Allowance, Incapacity Benefits, Jobseeker’s Allowance and Income Support. The Secretary of State announced on 8 December 2014 that DWP would do more to raise the awareness of Short Term Benefit Advances and as well as more information now on Gov.UK there should be posters and leaflets in all Jobcentres.

The data is only available from October 14 therefore we have provided the latest 12 months’ worth of data.

Only Working Age Benefits (i.e. ESA, IB, JSA and IS) are included in the above information for benefit advance applications as the number of applications received for State Pension Credit and Carer’s Allowance is not available.

The Source for the date is as follows: STBA Applications Received & Primary Benefits Paid - Management Information System Programme (MISP). This collation is based on clerical counts submitted by the Centres and is Internal MI which has been agreed for use in publications of Parliamentary questions and Freedom of Information requests.