Chichester District Council
Issue

Issue - meetings

Risk Based Verification Policy

Meeting: 03/10/2017 - Cabinet (Item 422)

422 Housing Benefit and Council Tax Reduction Risk Based Verification Policy 2018-2019 pdf icon PDF 60 KB

The Cabinet is requested to consider the agenda report and its appendix and to make the following resolutions:

 

(1)  That the introduction of a Risk Based Verification (RBV) Policy for the purpose of assessing claims for Housing Benefit and Council Tax Reduction with effect from 1 December 2017 be approved. 

 

(2)  That delegated authority be granted to the Head of Finance and Governance Services to make minor amendments to the RBV policy following consultation with the Cabinet Member for Finance and Governance Services.

Additional documents:

Decision:

RESOLVED

 

1.     That the introduction of a Risk Based Verification (RBV) Policy for the purpose of assessing claims for Housing Benefit and Council Tax Reduction be approved with effect from 1 December 2017.

 

2.     That authority be delegated to the Head of Finance and Governance Services to make minor amendments to the RBV policy following consultation with the Cabinet Member for Finance and Governance Services.

 

3.     That a report be brought back to Cabinet following the first 12 months of operation of the Risk Based Verification Policy.

 

Minutes:

The Cabinet received and considered the agenda report and its appendix.

 

The report was presented by Mrs Hardwick.

 

Mrs Rogers was in attendance for this item.

 

Mrs Hardwick explained that the new policy aimed to assist the Benefits Service to streamline and improve its delivery as part of a wider service review. The Reduction Risk Based Verification Policy (RBV) deployed a system (Xantura) to support the DWP’s aim to improve and focus local authority (LA) verification of claimants which assessed the risk posed by claimants in a welfare context according to 50 objective criteria. Claimants were split into low, medium or high risk categories in terms of likely fraud and/or error. The verification required of claimants depended on the resulting category of a claimant. Higher risk claimants were required to provide more robust and extensive evidence. Claimants were then split into four broad classes: pensionable age – non passported, pensionable age – passported, working age – passported and working age – non-passported. Passported claimants were those known to the system as having already claimed elsewhere. A high level assessment of these classes indicated currently approximately 33% of claimants were likely to be high risk.

 

Mrs Hardwick added that the RBV would reduce fraud and error, increase efficiency in processing claims and satisfy a requirement of the Council’s external auditors.

 

In response to Mr Wilding’s request to clarify the practical workings of the system, Mrs Rogers explained how Xantura have collected data from local authorities using Single Housing Benefit Extract (SHBE), a DWP function to assess Local Authority Benefit performance. This information has been used by Xantura to calculate the level of risk in new claims and changes. The scoring is then used to apply a risk score to an individual claim.

 

In response to Mrs Lintill’s request to understand the cost implications of the project, Mr Ward confirmed that the cost had been covered as part of a number of IT investments under the CA-Bens implementation project.

 

Members discussed the impact of the new data protection regulations on the scheme, in particular the requirement not to make automated decisions. Officers confirmed that procedures would be established to identify the need for a human decision.

 

Mr Dignum suggested a further recommendation requesting a report following the first 12 months of operation which was agreed by the other members of the Cabinet. Members agreed that the report should also be considered for inclusion in the Corporate Governance and Audit Committee’s work programme.

 

Decision

 

The Cabinet voted unanimously on a show of hands in favour of making the resolutions as set out below.

 

RESOLVED

 

1.     That the introduction of a Risk Based Verification (RBV) Policy for the purpose of assessing claims for Housing Benefit and Council Tax Reduction be approved with effect from 1 December 2017.

 

2.     That authority be delegated to the Head of Finance and Governance Services to make minor amendments to the RBV policy following consultation with the Cabinet Member for Finance and Governance Services.

 

3.     That a report be  ...  view the full minutes text for item 422


 

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