[2025] UKUT 344 (AAC)

Appeal No. UA-2024-000857-HB

Between:

EF

Appellant

– and –

THE LONDON BOROUGH OF BROMLEY

Respondent

Before: Upper Tribunal Judge Nicholas Paines KC

Decision date: 10 October 2025

Decided on consideration of the papers

ON APPEAL FROM:

Tribunal: TheFirst-tier Tribunal (Social Entitlement Chamber)

Tribunal Case No: SC124/23/02918

Tribunal Venue: East London

Hearing Date: 17 January 2024

SUMMARY OF DECISION

KEYWORD NAME (Keyword Number)

Housing benefit – other (16.9)

Recovery of overpayments - failure to disclose (27.3)

Reviews, revisions and supersessions – supersession: general (30.9)

I allow this appeal. I consider that the First-tier Tribunal’s decision involved an error of law because it misapplied the legislation that it considered.

The claimant suffers from a serious mental health condition and was in receipt of various benefits including housing benefit in respect of her then home. She moved out of that property in early November 2022 and into another property in the same borough in early December 2022. She did not tell the Borough Council about either move. The council found out from the DWP and wrote to the claimant suspending her housing benefit. A week later the council wrote again asking her to give information and enclosing a form for completion within one month; the letter did not refer to the possibility of asking for an extension of the one month deadline. A reminder was sent. The claimant did not reply.

A month later, on 21 February 2023, the council wrote saying that they had “de-suspended and stopped” the claimant’s HB claim and that there had been an overpayment which was recoverable, and an invoice would be raised. Subsequently, following further information, the period of the overpayment was extended backwards in time.

Later, with support from Mind, the claimant made contact with the council and appealed the council’s decision to the First-tier Tribunal, arguing that the decision to stop her HB completely should be replaced by a closed period supersession, stopping HB for the period when she was between tenancies and reinstating it from the time she became eligible for it in respect of the new tenancy. The tribunal dismissed her appeal on the ground that the claimant’s entitlement to HB had ceased as a result of the decision and she now had to claim universal credit.

I have held that that reasoning involved an error of law. The decision stopping the claimant’s HB was under appeal to the tribunal which could replace it with the decision that the council ought to have made. This included a closed period supersession if (as appears to be the case) the claimant was entitled to HB again as at the date of the council’s decision. The position would be different if regulation 14 of the Housing Benefit and Council Tax Benefit (Decisions and Appeals) Regulations 2001 applied. The tribunal did not consider whether regulation 14 applied. I have considered regulation 14 and concluded that it did not apply as some of the requirements for it to apply, as set out in previous decisions of the Upper Tribunal, were not satisfied.

Please note the Summary of Decision is included for the convenience of readers. It does not form part of the decision. The Decision and Reasons of the judge follow.] 

DECISION