You must tell us right away if any of your circumstances change for you or anyone who lives with you as this could affect how much Housing Benefit or Council Tax Reduction you get.
You must give full details of the change in your circumstances and the date of change. Please tell us about any changes as soon as possible so that we do not pay you too much Benefit or too little.
If you get too much benefit it is classed as an overpayment. We get back all overpayments unless they are caused by an official error and we could not expect you to know you were being overpaid. For further information about Overpayments please visit the overpayments page.
For changes to your Council Tax Reduction you may also face the addition of a penalty charge for late notification of a change that reduces your entitlement. For more on penalties please visit the Council Tax Penalties page.
The type of changes we need to know about are as follows:
- if you stop or start getting benefit
- if your rent changes
- if your or your partner's wages change
- if you and your family’s income changes this includes telling us if your benefits or universal credit changes
- if your savings or your family's savings change
- if anyone who lives with you has a change in their situation (such as starting work)
- if anyone who lives with you moves out
- if anyone moves in to live with you
- if you change your address
These are only some of the changes that you must tell us about. If you are not sure whether a change needs reporting tell us anyway. You can tell us of any changes in circumstances online by going to our Citizen Access Benefits portal.
Please do not delay telling us about your change. We will need to have proof of your change but if you cannot give us all the information immediately you should still submit your change. This way we can start to deal with your change and possibly avoid unnecessary overpayments or missing out on underpayment due.
If you are in receipt of Universal Credit you will need to inform the Department for Work and Pensions. You will need to sign into your Universal Credit account to report this.
If we require further proof we will contact you to tell you what information we need to update your claim. You will have 1 month to give us the proof. We may send additional forms for you to complete or direct you to additional online forms.