[Nedusa]

Originally Posted by thesheriff443

by continuing claiming this man was always going to be caught, its just a case of fraud, the fact that he used his dead daughter as a means to commit fraud does not add or detract from this case.

I agree........but the ease with which people are able to claim is almost verging on Entrapment. I mean in a moment of weakness a desparately poor family forget to cancel their recently deceased's mothers old age pension and now having continued to receive it find it hard to stop claiming it as they need the money for food and utilities. They figure it will stop soon anyhow but it continues for years.

It's only £70 a week so they figure the state wont miss it besides they have worked and paid taxes for decades and never claimed in the past. So they think morally they are entitled to it.

This is a more common scenario than most people think.

The onus should be on the Govt to put into place checks and balances that stop this type of unintentional fraud from being committed.

[user104658]

Originally Posted by Nedusa

I agree........but the ease with which people are able to claim is almost verging on Entrapment. I mean in a moment of weakness a desparately poor family forget to cancel their recently deceased's mothers old age pension and now having continued to receive it find it hard to stop claiming it as they need the money for food and utilities. They figure it will stop soon anyhow but it continues for years.

It's only £70 a week so they figure the state wont miss it besides they have worked and paid taxes for decades and never claimed in the past. So they think morally they are entitled to it.

This is a more common scenario than most people think.

The onus should be on the Govt to put into place checks and balances that stop this type of unintentional fraud from being committed.

As all deaths must be registered, you would think that it would be fairly simple for notification of a death to be passed on to the HMRC and DWP automatically. But apparently not. You're right it's too easy for people to fall into that trap - especially because, funerals are very expensive and are essentially "impulse purchases"... You get like a week to plan and organise finance for it, all the while still in shock and grieving over the death. So, you have people suddenly lumped with a £5000 debt before they can catch their breath, no real means to repay it... And it's easy to see why it might be tempting to keep that extra income source to cover it.