Childrens Allowance Suspension?

Welfarite said:
I don't understand. Why is increased control checks on SW payments an inefficiency? Surely this increased checking up is a result of the amoutn of fraud uncovered in the previous mailshot exercise?
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Because is it less than a year since we got the first.
They also appear to sent to only sent to people who appear to be 'non Irish' on your database. This could be viewed as being racist and may also be a breach of the Data Protection Acts, on the grounds that data is being used for proposed it was not originally intended for.
 
chrisboy said:
This is especially more important now, seeing as so many are heading home to their own countries.. The amount of people who have their irish bank accounts left open, and benefits being put in must be huge!
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It is not just the 'non nationals' who are leaving. I know of a number of Irish families who left over a year ago when the building work started to dry up.
 
Towger said:
Because is it less than a year since we got the first.
They also appear to sent to only sent to people who appear to be 'non Irish' on your database. This could be viewed as being racist and may also be a breach of the Data Protection Acts, on the grounds that data is being used for proposed it was not originally intended for.
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Obviously, SW will target what are considered 'high risk' categories of claimants rather than a scattergun approach as they have to use the resources available to them effectively. Quoting 'racist' and misuse of 'Data Protection Acts' is 'red herring' stuff. I would imagine that an annual review by mailshot is not being overcontrolling of this type of payment. can't see what your problem with it is.
 
Well let's be logical, if I was a social welfare officer looking at this type of fraud would I be better off sending out a confirmation letter to people whose names began with O', Mc or Murphy or to someone with Livorno, Wojciesko, Ti Pi in their name and would this be racist or efficiency?
 
i got my 2nd SW letter yesterday - the 2nd within the last 9 months where i had to confirm my details. both of my godmother's daughters have not worked for the past 15 years, both irish and both never received these types of letters.
i live in ireland for the last 9 years, worked 8 years and 3 months full time, paid/ paying all my taxes on a monthly basis and am employed with a company only located in ireland, i had to confirm twice within the past 9 months that i am a resident, let alone the entitlements.
both of my godmother's daughters could literally live abroad and yet they are not being questioned.
where is the joke here or shall i say justification? am i missing something? :confused:
 
These are the facts:

There are over half a million families getting CB for a million kids. In 2008, 70,000 to 100,000 letters issued to targeted groups of people, that's 20% of claimants. This year, another 100,000 letters will issue, including reviewing of 'Irish citizens', which some posters seem to think are exempt from reviews of this nature.
 
Towger said:
It is not just the 'non nationals' who are leaving. I know of a number of Irish families who left over a year ago when the building work started to dry up.
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Thats true too of course, also welfare fraud in 2007, was 13.9% by foreign nationals and 1.3% by irish citizens so thats another reason why maybe people who are non-irish might be getting targetted.
 
chrisboy said:
Thats true too of course, also welfare fraud in 2007, was 13.9% by foreign nationals and 1.3% by irish citizens so thats another reason why maybe people who are non-irish might be getting targetted.
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Where in the world did you get that statistic?
 
Welfarite said:
There are over half a million families getting CB for a million kids. In 2008, 70,000 to 100,000 letters issued to targeted groups of people, that's 20% of claimants. This year, another 100,000 letters will issue, including reviewing of 'Irish citizens', which some posters seem to think are exempt from reviews of this nature.
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Welfarite,
This is the second letter we got in less than a year. I have checked at work and no one else has ever gotten one. Where is this total of 100k letters coming from, sending out 50k to the same people twice a year? At a cost of say 5+ euro per letter, I can think of better ways to spend the money. To be honest I always thought that paying children’s allowance via EFT was wide open to abuse and I was involved in writing some of the software to do it!
 
Welfarite said:
It's 1.7% for Irish citizens.....http://www.independent.ie/national-news/clampdown-on-child-benefit-fraud-1335747.html
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What survey are they referring to? That's the actual source. Also, we don't know if this refers to child benefit fraud and, if so, the figures will be skewed towards non-nationals because, as is being discussed here, non-nationals (or, more to the point, people with non-national-sounding names) are being sent more of these enforcement notices than the Mary Byrnes.

I highly doubt if that statistic can actually be backed up by any "survey", regardless of what the Indo prints. If so, then we'd all know who was committing welfare fraud and it could be 100% stamped out, which it obviously isn't.
 
Towger said:
Welfarite,
This is the second letter we got in less than a year. I have checked at work and no one else has ever gotten one. Where is this 100k letters coming from, sending out 50k to the same people twice a year? To be honest I always thought that paying children’s allowance via EFT was wide open to abuse and I was involved in writing some of the software to do it!
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All I'm saying is that the stats show one in five families are reviewed annually. How they select them is another matter. If you're that disturbed that you are on a 'high risk' list that warrants two reviews in a year, perhaps ask them why this is happening? Maybe you just came up on two targeted lists, computer selected? I don't know.
The EFT facility is of course wide open to abuse, hence the auditor general asking SW to have intensive reviewing of schemes that pay using it.
 
WaterSprite said:
What survey are they referring to? That's the actual source. Also, we don't know if this refers to child benefit fraud and, if so, the figures will be skewed towards non-nationals because, as is being discussed here, non-nationals (or, more to the point, people with non-national-sounding names) are being sent more of these enforcement notices than the Mary Byrnes.

I highly doubt if that statistic can actually be backed up by any "survey", regardless of what the Indo prints. If so, then we'd all know who was committing welfare fraud and it could be 100% stamped out, which it obviously isn't.
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Well i doubt the independant just plucked these figures from the sky! I too got one of these letters, and i have an irish name, at first i was a bit miffed at being "picked" for a letter, but now i'm quite happy that something is being done to counter the fraudulent claims, which we all have to pay for..
 
The figures came from a DSW press release, quoting figures from the Control Section of the department.
 
Towger said:
Welfarite,
Where is this total of 100k letters coming from, sending out 50k to the same people twice a year?
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That would never happen nor would sending mutiple letters for health appointments to dead people for years.
 
Welfarite said:
Maybe you just came up on two targeted lists, computer selected? I don't know.
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Well Alaskaonline got a second one as well. Chances are that the same mail merge/SQL query was done again, and thinking about it probably by accident/ineptitude rather than on purpose.
 
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