Below are real examples of recent benefit fraud cases.
Case 1
Mr A and his wife had been in receipt of Housing and Council Tax Benefit since the year 2000. When he claimed, he advised us that his total savings were under £2000.
The Housing Benefit Data Match service provides Local Authorities with information matched with other government agencies. In 2008, Southampton City Council’s Benefits Department received data matched with Her Majesty’s Revenues & Customs relating to Mr A which indicated that he had a substantial amount of capital in a bank account.
Using powers granted by the Social Security Administration Act 1992, our investigator obtained copies of Mr A’s bank statements and it was discovered that he had had over £160,000 in undeclared savings since the start of his claim. This resulted in him being overpaid more than £30,000 in Housing & Council Tax Benefit.
Mr A attended court and he was given a suspended prison sentence, suspended for 2 years. Should he reoffend he will have to serve 36 weeks imprisonment. The condition of the suspension is that he does 180 hours unpaid work.
A summons under the Proceeds of Crime Act was also included for which he also received 6 weeks imprisonment, suspended. He also had to pay £375 costs and repay the benefit he had not been entitled to.
Case 2
Miss B had been claiming Housing and Council tax Benefit for over 10 years. She was in receipt of Income Support and had advised both the Job Centre and Southampton City Council that she lived alone with her young son.
A member of the public (who wished to remain anonymous) telephoned the fraud team and was able to provide information regarding a partner which they believed had lived Miss B for some years.
A joint investigation was carried out by officers from both the Local Authority & Job Centre and information to support this allegation was uncovered.
Miss B was formally interviewed under caution and, faced with overwhelming evidence, admitted that her partner had been resident for almost 4 years. She appeared at court and received a 12 month Community Order, was ordered to carry out 200 hours of unpaid work and pay £250 in costs, she also had to pay back the £6,400 she had been overpaid in benefits.
Case 3
Mrs C had been receiving Housing & Council Tax Benefit for several years based on the fact that her only income was her widow’s pension.
During the renewal of her benefit claim, information which she provided suggested that she had not fully declared her income.
After a thorough investigation, it was discovered that Mrs C had been receiving a private pension for the duration of her claim and had also worked for 5 different companies over a 4 year period. She had not declared any of this to Southampton City Council. As a result of this, Mrs C was overpaid in excess of £6,000 in benefit to which she was not entitled.
Mrs C was successfully prosecuted at Southampton Crown Court and the judge imposed a Suspended Sentence of 10 months custody suspended for 12 months. In passing sentence, the judge commented that benefit fraud was "the sort of thing people are angry about" and he would have sent her to prison if she had been in better health.
Southampton City Council
