It is widely anticipated that at long last the DWP is going to drastically reduce the wait for repayments of Universal Credit tenants rental arrears, which will be a huge relief to both landlords and affected tenants.

The Department for Works and Pensions has just held discussions with several stakeholders including a firm running an accreditation scheme for agents, and unveiled their plans to change the timescale of repayments for affected UC renters in arrears, and landlords will be ‘over the moon’ with this news.

At present landlords upon notifying the DWP that their UC tenants are in rental arrears, can be made to wait for as long as nine weeks to receive payment.

The DWP is proposing that with its new processing method it could mean landlords may only have to wait around seven days after applications are received, and is a massive change in favour for both tenants and landlords.

However the new timescale will only be for new rent arrears’ applications but existing notifications prior to a new deadline along with direct landlord rent payments will continue to be ‘put through the wringer’ because they will be processed separately before the new launch date is announced.

Isobel Thomson, the chief executive for the agent management scheme,  said: “We are delighted with this change and it will make a big difference to landlords to know that in the event a tenant on Universal Credit falls into arrears that these will be paid quicker.

“We look forward to the detail of the change when it is launched and well done to DWP for their work on this for the benefit or tenants, landlords and agents.”

Richard Merrick of PIMS, says: “ Overall this is excellent news indeed but hopefully landlords will not be aggravated by ‘extra red tape’ or new system changes floundering…..we shall wait and see.”

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