Universal Credit: Alternative Payment Arrangements Guidance

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The Government has released guidance to providing Alternative Payment Arrangements for Universal Credit claimants who cannot manage their single monthly payment.

Universal Credit (UC) is paid in a single monthly sum, designed to prepare claimants for the world of work in which 75% of employees are paid monthly by encouraging claimants to take responsibility for their own finances.

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Landlords unable to identify payments for UC tenants due to changes in DWP system

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Caridon Landlord Solutions is calling on The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) to urgently address the changes to its payment system, which have left landlords unable to identify which housing cost payments of Universal Credit should be allocated to which tenants.

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Furnished lets, broadband and housing benefit

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Today we find out more about the campaigners telling the social sector it must learn from the PRS, the publication of proposed broadband legislation and an ombudsman warning on housing benefit. Social sector ‘has lessons to learn’ from PRS The End Furniture Poverty (EFP) organisation has said that the social housing sector has lessons to […]

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New Housing Benefit (UC) Guide for landlords…

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Universal Credit:

The government has
issued a new comprehensive guide to Universal Credit (UC) as it
applies to rented housing, specifically for landlords.

The guide provides private and social housing landlords with detailed information about how to deal with Universal Credit payments. It is designed give landlords an understanding of how they can help their tenants prepare for UC:

• how housing
  payments are calculated
• the move on to
  the single Universal Credit benefit payment system
• making payments
  of their rent to their landlord themselves

Given all the
controversy around UC, direct payments, and possible rent arrears, it
is in all landlords’ with benefit tenants best interests to ensure
that they understand the system and that the transition goes as
smoothly as possible.

Tenants receiving
benefits through the new Universal Credit system receive one single
payment, rolling-up up to six separate benefits into the one payment.
It is also central tenet of the UK Housing benefit system that
payments are made to the tenant in the first instance, making them
responsible citizens and for their own payments for rent and other
necessities.

Landlords who rent
to tenants in receipt of benefits will benefit from the guide because
sooner or later they will be involved with UC. Even those landlords
who don’t initially let to tenants on benefits can become involved
if one of their tenants needs to claim for one reason or another,
redundancy or job loss for example.

The guide explains
how to monitor the important trigger points, and how to deal with
problems which can arise with payments, interventions by the
Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) and recovery of rent arrears
if they should occur.

All Universal Credit
claimants have an online UC account to manage their claim, and they
should have access to a “work coach” should they find they are
struggling to make payments. They may just need help managing and
budgeting their finances, but the guide helps by explaining how
landlords can go about getting an Alternative Payment Arrangement
(APA) set-up. These are payments made direct to them, if all else
fails.

The most common
problem for landlords with UC is when tenants experience difficulties
managing their single monthly payment and making sure the rent
element is split-off, with any top-up if needed, and paid regularly
to their landlord.

Where the tenant
does get into difficulty paying their rent, the claimant, their Work
Coach, Case Manager or their landlord can then apply for the
Alternative Payment Arrangement and (APA) Managed Payment to Landlord
(MPTL) scheme, which will be considered by the Department for Work
and Pensions (DWP) on a case by case basis.

An APA can in some
circumstances apply from day 1, or at any point throughout the UC
claim for those claimants who are not yet in rent arrears but who may
benefit in other ways from an APA. An APA can also include, a more
frequent than monthly payment or a split payment of an award between
partners.

The amount of any
managed payment the landlord receives can vary from month to month
depending on the claimant’s UC award, usually up to a maximum value
of the eligible housing costs.

See the guide for full details here

©1999 – Present | Parkmatic Publications Ltd. All rights reserved | LandlordZONE® – New Housing Benefit (UC) Guide for landlords… | LandlordZONE.

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Halifax House price index up 4% for December

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House prices in December were 4.0% higher than in the same month a year earlier with the average house price now at £238,963.

On a monthly basis, house prices rose by 1.7% and in the latest quarter (October to December) house prices were 1.0% higher than in the preceding three months (July to September).

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R2R exit strategies?

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Hi everyone, I was wondering whether anyone could provide insight on a question I’ve been asking myself for a while now. What exit strategies are used for the end of a Guaranteed rent contract?

More specifically, as you near the end of your 3/5 year lease with the landlord

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Only idiots have jobs!

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I applied in November to refinance one of my several properties. A huge amount of information was needed of my portfolio and some of the data required didn’t fit the pre-loaded application form.

I therefore completed what could be captured online and then completed the rest by hand.

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Empty homes, support for good landlords, broadband update and latest sell-off figures

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Today we look at the chancellor’s comments on absentee landlords, a government pledge that it will support good landlords to ‘thrive’, plans to make it easier to get broadband installed in blocks of flats – and a survey on the number of landlords planning to sell homes.  Absentee Landlords Chancellor Sajid Javid said there is […]

The post Empty homes, support for good landlords, broadband update and latest sell-off figures appeared first on RLA Campaigns and News Centre.

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Northampton Council HMO Licensing Rip-offs.

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A Northampton Landlord sent me this document and asked if I could get it out there. It would be great to get local landlord’s comments, make sure we inform those that do not already know and ask them to contact their Councillors etc.

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Charity pleads with Government to increase housing allowance

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Housing Benefit:

The housing charity Crisis is calling on the government to increase Local Housing Allowance (LHA) levels which thousand of tenants reply on for rent payments.

The austerity freeze
on housing benefit is leading to extreme hardship argues the charity
with LHA not having been lifted since 2016.

According to one
report published by Inside Housing, a weekly journal for
housing professionals in the UK, families are going without food;
they are unable to afford a full weekly food shop due to what Crisis
says is a housing benefit shortfall.

Rent being a
priority payment to keep a roof over their heads, some households
across England are being forced to give up a large part of their
weekly food shop in order to keep up with rent payments, says the
Charity.

Crisis says that
available data shows that the housing benefit shortfall, the amount
of an individual’s rent not covered by housing benefit, is equal to
families having to give up at least a quarter of the national average
weekly food shop. This would be for a small family in 70 of the
country’s 152 Broad Rental Market Areas.

“Broad Rental
Market Areas” are designated by the government and are used to
determine how much housing benefit private renters across the UK
receive.

According Crisis,
central London, where rents are among the highest in the country, has
the highest housing benefit shortfall. The average rent for the
cheapest third of two-bedroom properties is £523.56 compared with a
housing benefit rate of £320.74 says Crisis. This leaves a shortfall
of £202.82.

According to the
charity, the average national weekly food shop for a small family
(two adults and two children) is calculated at £59, meaning
foregoing the weekly food shop still does not cover the shortfall for
a London family.

Similarly, outside
of London in other expensive areas such as Cambridge, claimants are
experiencing high housing benefit shortfalls of around £36, which
equates to 61% of the average £59 weekly shop.

In Leicester, the
cheapest third of two-bedroom properties comes at £124.27, compared
to the housing benefit of £109.32, leaving a shortfall of £14.95.
Once the claimant has paid of the shortfall there is only £44.05
left for the weekly shop, which is around 75% of the cost of an
average weekly shop.

The government has
already indicated that the freeze will be lifted in April, with an
estimated rise equal to the of Consumer Price Index rate of
Inflation at 1.7%. However, Crisis says this would not be enough to
make up shortfalls.

Chief executive of
Crisis, Jon Sparkes says that lifting the freeze was not enough to
help those unable to afford their rent, as LHA rates:

“A safe and stable
home is fundamental to our dignity and humanity, but every day we
hear of people becoming homeless or being pushed to the brink of
losing the roof over their heads because of the constant pressure of
trying to cover the cost of their rent.

“Paying the rent
means families have no option but to make huge sacrifices on other
basic necessities. We cannot let this continue.

“Housing benefit
is an important tool and could be the quickest and most effective way
to prevent homelessness, but due to years of cuts and freezes it
simply does not cover people’s rent.

“With the right
policies and investment, we can end homelessness. We urge the new
government to act now and invest in housing benefit.”

A Department for
Work and Pensions spokesperson told Inside Housing:

“Since 2011 we’ve
provided local authorities with more than £1bn to support the most
vulnerable with Discretionary Housing Payments, and in 2020/2021 we
will make an additional £40m available.”

©1999 – Present | Parkmatic Publications Ltd. All rights reserved | LandlordZONE® – Charity pleads with Government to increase housing allowance | LandlordZONE.

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