Government rejects less than one per cent of nearly 3m expenses February 14, 2022 The Department of Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) has rejected just one claim out of more than 18,000 in the year to March 2021, which has raised eyebrows over at spend management firm Emburse. Across all government departments, rejected expense claims make up just 0.07 per cent of the total 2.95m submitted between 2019 [...]
Government readies pensions overhaul with digital dashboard consultation January 31, 2022 Government has outlined plans to overhaul savers’ access to pensions via a digital dashboard as it opened a consultation on new regulation today.
UK government shakes up Universal Credit in bid to tackle labour shortages, as vacancies hit record highs January 27, 2022 The UK government has said that unemployed people will be expected to look for any sort of work, within weeks of first claiming Universal Credit, if they are unable to find a job in their previous occupation. In an effort to move half a million people into employment by the end of June, the government [...]
Dropping earnings threshold and extending pensions auto-enrolment to younger and part-time workers could boost Brits’ savings by £2.7 trillion January 5, 2022 Abolishing the earnings treshold and extending pension auto-enrolment to working 18-year-olds and for part-time workers could add around £2.77 trillion to British pension savings, a think tank has said. The current auto-enrolment rules mean bosses must provide a workplace pension for staff aged 22 and over earning £10,000. But Onward, which describes itself as a [...]
Watch as DWP Secretary Therese Coffey sings ‘The Time of My Life’ as benefit cuts come into force October 7, 2021 It appears the Work and Pensions Secretary sang (I’ve Had) The Time Of My Life during the Conservative Party conference just hours after the Universal Credit cut came into force. Therese Coffey was captured on video performing a rendition of the power ballad with welfare minister Will Quince during a karaoke session in Manchester in [...]
Government’s ‘human error over many years’ to blame for UK pensioners underpaid by £1bn September 22, 2021 An investigation by the UK’s spending watchdog has found that “repeated human errors over many years” were to blame for the fact the Department for Work & Pensions (DWP) underpaid 134,000 pensioners over £1 billion in state pension. According to the National Audit Office (NAO), these errors occurred due to complex state pension rules, outdated [...]
State pension scandal: Human errors led to £1bn in underpayments for 134,000 Brits September 22, 2021 Repeated human errors led to more than £1bn-worth of state pensions being underpaid, the UK spending watchdog said this morning. Around 134,000 pensioners were underpaid, the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) said, adding it plans to pay an average of £8,900 to people affected, the National Audit Office (NAO) said. Most of those affected [...]
DWP apologises after delays in pension payments September 18, 2021 Thousands of pensioners have not yet been paid their state pension because of government backlogs. People who have just turned 66 have not been paid on time after backlogs in processing applications at the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP). Officials have apologised and said the delays were a result of the pandemic and staffing [...]
Benefit fraud and overpayments hit record £8.3bn during pandemic July 15, 2021 Fraud and error overpayments in the benefits system were pushed to record levels last year, largely because of bogus Universal Credit claims during the coronavirus pandemic. The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) estimates it overpaid £8.3bn (7.5 per cent) out of £111.4bn of benefits other than the state pension in 2020-21, an increase of [...]
Serco profits set to rise 50 per cent, bolstered by Covid contracts demand June 30, 2021 Outsourcing giant Serco today said it expects profit to reach up to £125m in the first half of the year – up more than 50 per cent from the first half of 2020. Serco, which has outperformed the wider UK outsourcing space, said in a trading update this morning that it expects stronger demand for [...]