As a key deadline approaches, more than 356,000 households could lose their benefit payments starting tomorrow.
The managed migration program run by Labour which moves people from old benefits to Universal Credit, ends on March 31.
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The Department for Work and Pensions DWP says that 356,521 households are still at risk of losing their payments if they don’t do something.
Since July 2022 about 1.82 million households have received migration notices telling them to switch to Universal Credit.
About 1.57 million of them have successfully made a claim, and just over 10,600 cases are still open.
If you get a migration notice you have three months to respond or you could lose your current benefits.
As part of the transition six old benefits will be replaced.
These are the Working Tax Credit, Child Tax Credit, Housing Benefit income-related Employment and Support Allowance Income Support, and income-based Jobseeker’s Allowance.
A benefits calculator can help people who are applying for Universal Credit figure out if they qualify and how much they might get.
According to government data about 1.4 million people who switch from old benefits to Universal Credit should be better off.
Another 300,000 people are expected to see no change in their payments.
But under the new system about 900,000 claimants might get less.
About 600,000 of those people may be able to get transitional protection payments if they go through the managed migration process.
This help is meant to make sure that people who switch don’t lose their income right away.
People who switch on their own or miss the deadline and claim later will not be able to get transitional protection.
Claimants who do not move onto Universal Credit risk having their payments stopped and may also miss out on future benefit increases.
