Information request and response under the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002
FOI Reference: FOI/202400425075
Date received: 2 August 2024
Date responded: 2 September 2024
Information requested
Request for information 1: In a monthly breakdown, the number of recorded instances of late/overdue payments of Adult Disability Payment to a recipient from May 2023 to May 2024.
Request for information 2: In a monthly breakdown, the number of recorded instances of late/overdue payments of Scottish Child Payment from May 2023 to May 2024.
Request for information 3: If possible, and only if possible, please highlight the most late payment on record (in terms of days gone past without the benefit being paid).
Response
With reference to the Social Security (Scotland) Act 2018, Social Security Scotland define a late payment as one which is made beyond the date committed to on award letters when a determination was made.
Social Security Scotland actively monitors the progress of all payments made. Exceptions do occur and manual intervention is required to correct exceptions, and this will normally lead to the credit occurring after the initially expected date.
Request for information 1 and 2:
Please find below a table containing the requested information, for the period May 2023 to May 2024:
|
Month and Year |
ADP Count |
SCP Count |
|
May 2023 |
130 |
128 |
|
June 2023 |
220 |
123 |
|
July 2023 |
68 |
32 |
|
August 2023 |
156 |
45 |
|
September 2023 |
301 |
42 |
|
October 2023 |
180 |
15 |
|
November 2023 |
104 |
23 |
|
December 2023 |
259 |
7 |
|
January 2024 |
75 |
16 |
|
February 2024 |
124 |
15 |
|
March 2024 |
151 |
23 |
|
April 2024 |
145 |
25 |
|
May 2024 |
157 |
21 |
|
Total |
2,070 |
515 |
To provide context to the figures above it may be helpful to review these in conjunction with published statistics of total payments made in the period. The latest publications providing the total number of payments for Adult Disability Payment (ADP), up to April 2024, and for Scottish Child Payment (SCP), up to March 2024, can be found at:
Social Security Scotland - Adult Disability Payment: high level statistics to 30 April 2024
Social Security Scotland - Scottish Child Payment: high level statistics to 31 March 2024
For example, during March 2024, from a total of 493,365 ADP payments, 151 (approximately 0.03%) were recorded as late. During the same period, from a total of 221,210 SCP payments, 23 (approximately 0.01%) were recorded as late.
Request for information 3:
By the above definition of a late payment, the latest payment on record across Adult Disability Payment and Scottish Child Payment, during the period May 2023 to May 2024, is 54 days. The latest payment on record for this period occurred as it was a high value payment. There are circumstances which must be considered before Social Security Scotland release a high value payment. Additional checks are required, including confirming that no safeguarding issues are present. This may lead to a payment being released beyond the date committed to on the award letter.
About FOI
Social Security Scotland is committed to publishing all information released in response to Freedom of Information requests. The Scottish Government also publishes responses to requests. You can view the responses at http://www.gov.scot/foi-responses.