To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions what is the maximum period of time within which (a) benefit claimants are able to make backdated claims for benefit entitlement and (b) for which his Department may seek repayments of overpayments made in error. (247042)

Each benefit has a prescribed time within which a claim must be made in order to establish entitlement—in most cases, three months. With income support and jobseeker’s allowance a claim can be backdated for up to three months in certain circumstances.

There is no time limit to the period that the Department can seek to recover an overpayment, just as there is no time limit on the payment of arrears of benefit where the Department is responsible for an underpayment.