avevale_intelligencer (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
avevale_intelligencer) wrote2009-10-30 11:01 am
avevale_intelligencer) wrote2009-10-30 11:01 am
YES!!!
I saw this happening in the Pensions Service while I was working there. The rules were clear: if the claimant was not at fault in cases of overpayment (in other words, if the DWP had made a mistake) there was no entitlement to claw back the money. Despite this, it became the policy to send out letters demanding the money back, and it became verboten to tell claimants about the rule. I didn't have the clout (or maybe the moral courage) to object, but I'm overjoyed that someone was able to fight it, and even more so that this case has been won.
Mistakes happen. It's a human thing. Often they are to the claimants' detriment. Sometimes they are to the claimants' benefit. But this is not a case of parity. The government is here to serve the people, not the other way around, and either way when they make a mistake it is the people who lose. Deliberate fraud is another matter, and should be punished, but no agency should be immune from the cost of incompetence. When the government, through official error, pays someone twice (or three or four or five times, yes, it does happen), then the solution is not to claw back the money and pretend it didn't happen, but to accept the loss as the cost of poor training, inefficiency, understaffing and underpaying, and work all the harder to reduce the possibility of such mistakes. That's the reasoning behind the rule, and I find it sound, and I found this attempt to deceive the public shameful, disgusting and morally abhorrent. I'm glad a step has been taken to redress that.
Mistakes happen. It's a human thing. Often they are to the claimants' detriment. Sometimes they are to the claimants' benefit. But this is not a case of parity. The government is here to serve the people, not the other way around, and either way when they make a mistake it is the people who lose. Deliberate fraud is another matter, and should be punished, but no agency should be immune from the cost of incompetence. When the government, through official error, pays someone twice (or three or four or five times, yes, it does happen), then the solution is not to claw back the money and pretend it didn't happen, but to accept the loss as the cost of poor training, inefficiency, understaffing and underpaying, and work all the harder to reduce the possibility of such mistakes. That's the reasoning behind the rule, and I find it sound, and I found this attempt to deceive the public shameful, disgusting and morally abhorrent. I'm glad a step has been taken to redress that.
no subject
The rules for clawing it back are clear: if it's the claimant's fault because he didn't tell us important things, we claw it back. If he told us everything and we were incapaple of making the right decision, it's our problem - unless the claimant had to be aware that he'd gotten too much money, and that's only the case in very rare cases. The thought behind these rules are simple: if the claimant could trust to have gotten the right amount of money, he can keep it. If he had to be aware that something was wrong and chose not to tell, it's his fault, too. And in most cases the mistakes made are such that the claimants couldn't know.
no subject
A government department just has to pay some of the money back if they get caught.
And since the cost of doing it is effectively zero (just print out a form letter) there's nothing to stop them trying it on. Morality is evidently no bar at all. It's massive hassles and stress for the victims, but no problem for the bureaucrats.