Politics

Universal Credit helpline bombarded with 5.8million calls in seven days



The government’s Universal Credit helpline has been hit by 5.8million calls in seven days from people suffering in the coronavirus outbreak.

Officials have been forced to quadruple capacity in some areas after being swamped with desperate new claimants to the six-in-one benefit.

The figure included 2.2million calls to the DWP’s helpline on a single day, Monday 30 March.

The shocking figures may include repeat callers. Some people the Mirror spoke to were having to call again and again without getting through.

Today the DWP admitted access to its phone lines had to be “controlled” in order to stop critical services like NHS 111 collapsing.

DWP chiefs have also been forced to completely halt a major review of disabled people’s benefits, which will hand thousands of people a higher payment.

But officials insisted delays in verifying people’s identity are now down to five minutes, and otherwise people were not delayed in filing a UC claim online.

More than a million people have claimed UC since March 16, nine times the average, despite cash help for people hit by the outbreak.

Employed workers can be ‘furloughed’ on up to 80% of their pay, while the self-employed can claim up to 80% of their profits in a lump sum.

But the cash for the self-employed won’t be available before June, leaving many in financial peril.

The government has removed a key restriction on self-employed people claiming UC, the Minimum Income Floor, and raised it by £1,040 a year.

Stephen Timms, chairman of the Commons Work and Pensions Committee, thanked DWP staff for a “Herculean effort”.

Urging any victims of the system to write to his committee through this link, he said: “We are keen to hear about any specific problems claiming benefits.

“And also more generally about whether people are getting enough money to support themselves and their families during these immensely difficult days.”

The new figures on Universal Credit were revealed in a letter to MPs from Permanent Secretary Peter Schofield, the DWP’s highest-ranking civil servant.

He confirmed that in the five days from March 23, 1.8m calls were made to the Universal Credit helpline.

That then rose to 2.2m on March 30 and 1.8m on March 31.

Mr Schofield admitted call volumes were “extremely high”, especially in the peak hours of 11am to 2pm.

He told MPs: “In order to protect services across the national telephony network, including critical services such as NHS 111, telephony network providers introduce measures to control the number of calls onto the Universal Credit line.”

The controls are “dynamically set throughout the day” to “protect the stability” of national infrastructure, he said. Chiefs are holding meetings twice a day about capacity.

Claimants were sitting in online queues more than 100,000 people long to verify their identity for UC.

Mr Schofield said capacity for this “bottleneck”, run by the Cabinet Office, has now been quadrupled and waits are down to five minutes.

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Citizens Advice have also been given a second year of funding worth £39m to help people with claims.

But Mr Schofield could not rule out people having their first UC payment delayed beyond five weeks, or having to wait longer than usual for an advance.

“The whole department is focusing on ensuring that the highest possible standards are achieved,” he said.

And he admitted other DWP work has ground to a halt after 10,000 staff were moved to the front line.

That stalled work includes a review of 1.6million disability claims to check who should be given more money.

Staff had been reviewing Personal Independence Payment (PIP) claims for almost two years after a 2016 tribunal ruled it should be open to more people.

The review has so far paid out £28m to people who suffer “overwhelming psychological distress” when travelling alone.

However, Mr Schofield said it and all other “administrative exercises” have now been “paused” until at least June.

He added: “The Department is working round the clock to help people across the country in these extraordinary times to make sure people get the support they need.”





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