A man from Weston-super-Mare has been ordered to carry
out 80 hours of unpaid work following his conviction for benefit
fraud.
Steven Foxall, aged 51, from South Rd in the town, made a claim
for job seekers allowance in October 2007. Due to this claim he was
also entitled to housing benefit and council tax benefit, both of
which are administered by us.
We investigated the claim when we received information from the
housing benefit matching service that his job seekers allowance had
been terminated as he had started paid employment. The housing
benefit matching service is a computer database that compares
different information held by different agencies and notifies those
authorities where there is a discrepancy. The data match indicated
that Mr Foxall was in paid employment despite his claim for housing
and council tax benefit being made on the basis that his only
income was job seekers allowance.
Further investigation revealed that he had been in paid work
from 19 February 2008 to 19 August 2008 with average hours worked
of approximately 33 ½ hours per week.
He was interviewed under caution on 11 November 2008. He
admitted that he was aware that he should have informed the council
that he had started paid employment and said that it was his 'own
fault'.
He did not declare this work as a change to his circumstances to
us and because of this has been overpaid £1891.47 in housing
benefit and £581.38 council tax benefit (a total of £2472.85).
When he appeared before North Somerset magistrates he was
sentenced to 80 hours unpaid work and ordered to pay the council's
costs of £250.00.
Cllr Elfan Ap Rees, deputy leader, said: "We will take
appropriate action against those who try and defraud the benefits
system which exists to help those in need. This case came to light
due to information sharing which will help us investigate this type
of fraud."
