Title: Landlord Update July 2010
Author: ian lloyd
Last saved by: Lorraine Knight
Company: Isle of Wight Council

Landlord Update December 2010

As part of the Isle of Wight Councils effort to liaise with Landlords, this update is to provide you with the latest news surrounding recent announcements proposed by Central Government to the Housing and Council Tax Benefit Schemes.  The update will also provide you with information on our current service delivery and arrangements being put in place for Christmas relating to payments.

Future changes to the Benefit scheme
The July 2010 Landlord update provided a brief summary of the Governments Budget proposals around changes to Housing Benefit.  

The Benefits Service has provided a summary of the changes on the Council’s website and this will be updated on a regular basis when further detail is released and the proposals have been laid before Parliament.  I would urge all landlords to visit the website and become familiar with the proposals that will begin to take effect from April 2011, so that you are kept aware of these changes and that you also inform your tenants.

One key announcement that has just come out is that LHA levels are to be based on 30^th percentile for all new claims rather than the median point from April 2011.  The original intention was to bring this in from October 2011.  Existing claimants will not see the change applied to them until October 2011 and only when they are due an LHA anniversary review.  There may also be transitional protection for nine months for LHA review cases.   Further clarification will be provided on our website when the guidance has been released by The Department for Works and Pensions.

Local Housing Allowance latest
The Local Housing Allowance (LHA) rates are published every month on our website. The level of Local Housing allowance normally applies for a period of twelve months from the date a claim is received. Once twelve months has passed the level of Local Housing Allowance is amended based on the current rates and set for another twelve month period. 
The December LHA rates are listed below for your information.
Category | Room Need | LHA Rate Applicable
A | Shared room rate | weekly: £ 67.00           monthly: £ 290.33
B | 1 Bedroom | weekly: £ 98.08           monthly: £ 425.01
C | 2 Bedroom | weekly: £ 126.92         monthly: £ 549.99
D | 3 Bedroom | weekly: £ 155.77       monthly: £ 675.00
E | 4 Bedroom | weekly: £ 196.15         monthly: £ 849.98
F | 5 Bedroom | weekly: £ 219.23         monthly: £ 950.00
The Local Housing allowance rates are based on market data for non Housing Benefit tenancies supplied to the Valuation Office. Any landlord who is renting property to tenants not in receipt of Housing Benefit can supply data to the Rent Service and information of how to do this is available on their website.    http://www.voa.gov.uk/housing_benefit/lettingsresearch.htm 
If you are interested in what the LHA rates may look like when the 30^th Percentile lower rates are introduced in April 2011 if they had been introduced now, please refer to the Valuation Office Agency website at: http://www.voa.gov.uk/LHADirect/Documents/LHA_percentile_rates_Dec_2010.html 
Performance 
Our local targets for 2010/11 has been to process all new claims on average within 17 days, change of circumstances within 8.5 days and our National Indicator 181 (Right Time) target has been to process all new claims and change events within 11 days.   Our reported performance is as follows:
| Jul | Aug | Sep | Oct | Year to date average
New Claims : end to end processing (days) | 13.71 | 16.10 | 18.29 | 15.28 | 17.05
Changes in circumstances (days) | 9.47 | 10.52 | 11.01 | 12.17 | 11.18
National Indicator 181 (Right Time) | 10.31 | 11.62 | 13.25 | 12.79 | 12.30

The volume of change of circumstances being reported to the office for processing has increased considerably compared to the same point last year with an increase in the region of 63%.  This has impacted greatly on the speed of processing change events against our performance target figure but the service strives to process these changes as quickly as possible.

Christmas arrangements

The Christmas payment arrangements are being scheduled as follows:  
The scheduled Landlord cheque four weekly in arrears payments – due to be dispatched 9 December & 6 January.  These dates have not been changed. 

The scheduled Landlord Bacs four weekly in arrears payments – due to be cleared in your bank accounts 13 December and 10 January.  There is no change to these dates.

The claimant scheduled cheque two weekly in arrears payments have had to be adjusted slightly – Payments due to cover the period up to 26 December will now be dispatched on 21 December instead of the 24 December by first class post. 

The claimant scheduled Bacs two weekly in arrears payments – due to be cleared in their bank accounts on 27 December will instead be in their bank accounts on 24 December (due to the Bank Holidays).
The scheduled Cheques and Bacs payments due to be received on 10 January will be as normal.

The scheduled two weekly in advance payments have had to be adjusted slightly – Cheque payments due to cover the period up to 16 January will now be dispatched 23 December instead of 29 December.  The Bacs two weekly in advance payments will be paid into bank accounts on 4 January due to a Bank Holiday on 3 January).

All postal cheque payments will be sent by second class post as per normal unless indicated otherwise.  The Council Offices will close at 3pm on Friday 24 December and will be open again 8.30 am on 4 January.  Please refer to the Councils website or the press for further information nearer the time.

Isle of Wight Landlord Information Fair 

The next Isle of Wight Landlord Information Fair is due to be held at the Riverside Centre, Newport on 11th January 2011 at 6pm.  Presentations at this event will include:  

•           Changes to Local Housing Allowance in October 2010
•           How to end an Assured Shorthold tenancy and serving a section 21 notice
•           Landlord and Tenant Housing Renewal Enforcement: Who is responsible for what

For further information or to reserve a place for this event, please email housing@iow.gov.uk or telephone Housing Services on 01983 823040.

Future Landlord updates

Due to the need to review the costs associated with all publications, all Landlord updates in future will only be available on the Benefits Service website at:  http://www.iwight.com/council/departments/revenues/Benefits/landlord.asp.

The website also provides all the previous landlord updates circulated and will in future store any new additions.  Please refer to the link on a regular basis to check for any further updates that should be available on a four monthly basis.