Changes in Circumstances

The law says you must tell us if there is any change to the information we have used to calculate your housing benefit or council tax benefit.

You should tell us within one month of the change happening. We may need to change the amount we pay you, or stop your benefit completely because of a change therefor we recommend that you tell us as soon as the change occurs.

If you delay telling us about a change, we may go on paying the same rate of benefit as before and you could be overpaid benefit you are no longer entitled to. We will expect you to pay back any benefit that you are overpaid.

If you take more than a month to tell us of a change that would give you more benefit, we can only increase your benefit from the Monday after the date you told us. If there are strong reasons that explain your delay we may be able to pay the extra money from an earlier date, but we cannot guarantee that.

If you don't report a change that you know to affect your benefit, and don't have a good reason for this, you are committing a criminal offence, just as if you gave us false information or concealed the truth.

What you Need to Tell Us About

You need to tell us about any change that could affect your benefit, for example, if there is any change to your or your partner's:

• benefits
• income
• capital or savings
• rent or accommodation (if you are a council tenant you don't need to tell us about any rent changes)
• tax credits

Please also tell us if:

• you change your address
• the number of people in your home changes
• anyone who lives with you starts or stops work
• there is any change in the income of someone who lives with you
• a child leaves school.
• you leave your home temporarily for 13 weeks or more
• you, or your partner, become or stop being a student

We cannot list all of the changes in circumstance that you should tell us about, but if you are not sure whether we need to know please tell us anyway.

How to Tell Us

You can contact us, we will tell you if you need to provide any further information. Click on the link on the left under Main Menu, for details about how to contact us.

You can do it online, click on the Do It Online link on the right, click on online forms, then Housing and Council Tax Forms then Change of Circumstances Form, follow the instructions on the page to submit your details.

You should tell us:

• what the change is
• when the change happened

What Happens Next

When you tell us that your circumstances have changed we will write to you if you need to provide more information. If we write to you, you should provide the information we ask for within one month of the date we asked for it.

So that we are able to make the right decision about your claim you might be asked to give us information that you have not had to give us before, like proof of the change, such as new wage slips, tax credit award letters or bank statements.

We may suspend payments of your benefit if the change in your circumstances means that you are entitled to less benefit. We do this to help prevent overpaid benefit. We will tell you in a letter if we suspend payment of your benefit. We will continue to make payments at the new rate when we have received all the information from you to make a new decision about your benefit. If you are no longer entitled payments will stop.

We will usually tell you how much benefit you will get within 14 days after we get all the details from you. This letter is called a decision notification letter. This letter will tell you how we have worked out your benefit. You should read this letter carefully to make sure your benefit is correct.

How to Disagree With Our Decision

The decision notification letter will tell you what to do if our decision is wrong or you do not agree with our decision, you can either ask us to explain our decision, ask us to look at our decision again or you can appeal against our decision. You should contact us within one month of the date on the decision notification letter.

For more details about how to disagree with our decision, click on the link on the left under Main Menu.

Where to Find Out More Details

For answers to Frequently Asked Questions click on the link on the right under Do It Online.

For more details about housing benefit and Council Tax benefits in English and other languages, click on the Benefit Leaflets link on the right under Useful Websites.

Where to Get Help

You can always contact us for help and advice. Click on the link on the left under Main Menu for more details about how to contact us.

For a helpful contact list, click on the link at the bottom of the page under Downloadable Documents.

How to Comment on Our Service

You should contact us. We would like to know what you think about this website, or about the service we provide to you. Click on the link in the main menu for more details about how to contact us or email us benefits.service@islington.gov.uk