Universal Credit
We do not process claims for Universal Credit but continue to process housing benefit and local housing allowance claims. You can find information about how Universal Credit works on the Government website.
The Department for Work and Pensions has provided an information page for landlords which you can read on the Government website. It includes information on alternative payment arrangements if your tenant is in arrears.
Benefit payment
Local housing allowance is usually paid four weekly in arrears directly to the tenant. The tenant is then responsible for making arrangements to pay their rent to the landlord. But there are circumstances in which we may be able to pay the landlord directly. You can find out more on our local housing allowance page.
If your tenant has rent arrears, or they are unable or unlikely to pay their rent, you should contact us for advice. Where there are rent arrears, we will need to see the evidence.
Disclosing information
We can only provide information about a claim to those landlords who are receiving direct payments of housing benefit or where a tenant has given us written permission to do so. In these cases, the information we can disclose is limited and does not include the tenant's personal, household or financial circumstances.
Where we pay a landlord directly, we will write to them and let them know the dates that benefit starts and ends and the weekly rate of entitlement.
Landlord's duties
Landlords who receive direct payment of benefit have a legal responsibility to tell us about changes in circumstances that could affect their tenant's entitlement.
It is important that changes are reported straight away to avoid any overpayment of benefit. If a tenant leaves a property, any overpaid benefit may be recoverable from the landlord.