If you've been overpaid Housing Benefit or Council Tax Support

If you've been overpaid Housing Benefit or Council Tax Support, we'll write to you about the overpayment and tell you:

• the reason for the overpayment
• how much you've been overpaid
• what period the overpayment relates to
• whether the overpayment will be recovered and how

How we recover overpayments

There are various ways we can recover overpayments. These are:

• deductions from your Council Tax account
• deductions from your Housing Benefit entitlement
• asking you to repay the overpayment - if you're not on benefits

Repaying Council Tax Support overpayments

We’ll deduct overpaid Council Tax Support from your Council Tax account.

You’ll get a new Council Tax bill with the details of how to make payments. 

Repaying Housing Benefit overpayments

If we cannot deduct your overpayment from an account or entitlement, we'll send you an invoice for the repayment.

You can either pay the invoice in full or in instalments.

If you do not repay an overpayment, you could face legal action.

Arrange to pay in instalments

Contact the Benefit Recovery team to arrange to pay by instalments. You'll need to give your Housing Benefit reference number.

Appeal rights

If you disagree with our decision to recover the overpayment, you have the right to ask us to reconsider. 

You must normally request this in writing within one month of the original decision date.

Find out more about how to appeal a decision

Get help

Contact the Welfare Rights Service for a free benefits check.

If you're struggling with debt and money matters, it's important to get specialist advice.

You can also make a benefits payment online.