I recieved a letter from DWP saturday

[missy1981]

... its starts....Invitation to an office interview. We need to discuss?
a query that has arisen concerning your benefit laim. it is essential that you attend this interview. if you do not it may affect your benefit.... Has anybody else had this happen? and what is it about.. thankyou xx

[black bunny]

I work in a Jobcentre and I can tell you that this letter will be from the Investigations department. Some information will have been received which either throws doubt on the amount of benefit you are receiving or if you are actually entitled to benefit at all.
If you have nothing to hide and your conscience is clear, you have nothing to fear - you will be told what the information is and you can dispute it or correct it (what they have received may be wrong, it has been known to happen).
Make sure though that you do attend, or if you can't get in touch with them to re-arrange the interview. If you don't your benefit may well be stopped till you do contact them

Hope this has been helpful. Try not to worry about this, as I said, if you have done nothing wrong, it will soon be cleared up.

[missy1981]

Thankyou for your very helpful answer... I have recently got in touch with the CSA (about 2 weeks ago) and informed them that i had stopped overnight access between my daughter and her dad, access was 2 nights a week, but its no overnight now and reduced to a few hours a week. I have since heard nothing from the CSA after i was told that i would recieve a new claim form in the post, but havent recieved or heard nothing.
I have had a lot of personal issues & problems that have occured at home, and have had to have someone come in and check on me and my daughter everyday, but its so personal and upsetting that i don't feel comfortable disscussing it with complete strangers i.e the people that have to interview me, I'm more scared of the bloke than the interview itself. I don't feel comfortable leaving my home without somebody with me, and then have to sit in a room with a man i don't know and probably have to explain stuff that i don't feel comfortable disscussing... Do they do home visits, and would i be allowed to have a female persons present with them?

[black bunny]

Not sure they would do a home vist, but you could ring them and explain exactly how you've explained it to me, and see if they would come to your home, as the circumstances are exceptional. Then you could have a friend or relative present with you in your home.
If they won't home visit, then ask them if you could have a friend present in the interview. They would not object to that.
Do let me know how it goes, and please don't let this cloud your everyday life - I'm sure this will be something you can put right and then you can forget about it completely!

[missy1981]

thankyou black bunny for all your answers.. it turned out to be something to do with my old tenancy and new tenancy.. somebody had not ended my old tenancy when i moved out so housing benefit paid out more rent than they should have done, and also there was a query about my surname, my surname now is diffrent to my birth name.. if any of that makes sense???...
The man was very friendly and nice, i couldnt have a female present as they couldnt find one in time, but we were in an office on the ground floor, the door was left open for me and there were females visible outside of the office. He made every effort to make sure i was ok, but was very serious in the interview though...
Thankyou once again xx

[shopaholic84]

I had the same letter about a month ago. Don't worry. They just want to check that none of your circumstances have changed, i.e if you are working paid or unpaid, if absent father is paying maintenence and to look at your bank statements to see what money is coming in and out. If you have nothing to hide, everything will be fine.