Challenging Decisions

Overpayments: Challenging Decisions

A "person affected" by an overpayment can appeal about any matter relating to the overpayment.

A "person affected" will be:

the person who was overpaid (i.e. the claimant), and
anybody the HB Office can / are trying to recover the overpayment from. This could be the claimant's partner, or a HA / private landlord if the HB had been paid direct to them for the period of the overpayment.

Note: Council Housing Depts and ALMOs do not count as landlords, therefore HB overpayments cannot be recovered from them, therefore they do not have a right to appeal. But if you work for this type of landlord, you can still help the claimant to appeal, or appeal on their behalf with their authorisation. More on this page.

An appeal can only be submitted where a decision has actually been made. This means discretionary 'decisions' such as who to recover the overpayment from when more than one person could be the target, are not appealable.

Click on the buttons below to learn more.

By Landlord

Which overpayment decisions can a landlord challenge?

By Claimant

When should a claimant challenge an overpayment decision?

Time Limits

How quickly should the challenge be made - can this time limit be extended?

General Decisions

Challenging general issues regarding overpayments.