Privacy Notice for Housing Benefit and Local Council Tax Support

Data Controller:

Mole Valley District Council (MVDC) is the body exercising control over the purpose for which and the manner in which your personal data is processed.

Data Controller’s contact details:

MVDC, Pippbrook, Dorking RH4 1SJ. Telephone: 01306 885001.

Data Protection Officer:

Mr Tom Penlington (Solicitor): Telephone: 01306 879354

The legal basis for and the purposes of the processing:

The information MVDC collects and the information provided to us by the Department of Work and Pensions is required for the calculation of your Housing Benefit and/or Council Tax Support claim.

MVDC collects information about you, your partner, your children and other adults that live in your household. The information we collect includes your name, address, date of birth, National Insurance Number, email address, earned income and employment details, benefits and allowances, bank accounts, savings, investments, property ownership, rent paid, landlord details, immigration details and any other information required to calculate your Housing Benefit and/or Local Council Tax Support.

The personal data provided by you will be used:

• To administer Housing Benefit under the Housing Benefit Regulations 2006 and associated Regulations.
• To administer our Council Tax Support scheme under S13A and Schedule 1a of the Local Government Finance Act 1992 and associated Regulations.
• To make you liable (if appropriate) for Council Tax at your address.
• To aid debt collection such as Council Tax.
• To assist in the recovery of Housing Benefit Overpayments.

We will always ask your consent to share your personal information unless we have a legal duty or power to provide it without your consent. This is including and not limited to the prevention and detection of fraud, disclose of information to the police, matching council tax data with electoral records and protecting public funds in investigating misuse of public money.

The source of the personal data:

For the purposes of Housing Benefit and Council Tax Support applications you are the applicant and are the source of the personal data about you and the members of your household.

Personal information about you relating to you and your household may also be gathered from other sources such as private sector landlords, housing associations, lettings agents, Department of Work and Pensions, Job Centre Plus and HM Revenues and Customs.

Recipients and categories of recipients of the personal data:

By law we may be asked to provide information to the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) or HM Revenue & Customs, of which we must comply.

MVDC is under a duty to protect the public funds it administers, and to this end may use the information you have provided on this form for the prevention and detection of fraud. It may also share this information with other bodies responsible for auditing or administering public funds for these purposes. This includes MVDC’s statutory participation in the Cabinet office’s National Fraud Initiative (NFI) data matching exercises. For further information about data sharing for fraud prevention and investigation, see www.molevalley.gov.uk/datasharing.

We will not contact your landlord about your claim unless Housing Benefit is paid directly to them. In this case, we will disclose details about payment dates and amounts to your landlord.

If you wish to disclose the progress of your claim to your landlord we can release this information with your consent.

We may also ask you to fill in a claim form to make a fresh statement of your circumstances. If we do this, we may tell your landlord too.

If you previously didn’t agree to us sharing information about the progress of your claim with your landlord, but you change your mind after you have sent us your claim sheet, please tell us in writing that you now agree to share that information by contacting: benefits@molevalley.gov.uk

If you are a private tenant, we usually have to give the Valuation Office Agency Rent Service details about your home and rent.

We can share information collected as part of your Housing Benefit or Council Tax Support applications with other departments in the Council, other Local Authorities, and the Department for Work and Pensions and, in some circumstances, your landlord and other organisations.

The information we hold, including details of any social security benefits you may get, can only be shared for the following reasons:

To help with an application for another council service – If you apply for one or more of the following;

· a Discretionary Housing Payment

· help with non-statutory assistance (better known as supporting people services)

The information held by the council as part of your Housing Benefit or Council Tax Reduction application can be shared with and used by other council services to:

· help decide whether you qualify for help and how much, if anything, you should pay

· help identify and support people who are at risk of becoming homeless

· help identify families who may benefit from the Troubled Families Programme

· help people living in a Council or Housing Association property and who will be affected by the Benefit Cap and/or Under Occupation in the Social sector (by telling another part of the Council or your landlord, they will be able to advise you what you should do next and provide you with any assistance they can).

Further information on onward transfers:

MVDC will not transfer the personal data you have provided outside of the UK or European Union unless this is permitted in accordance with the Data Protection Act 2018

How long the personal data will be kept for:

The personal data you have supplied will be destroyed in accordance with MVDC’s Records retention and Disposal Schedule six years after the last payment on your claim. If a claim has an outstanding overpayment, we will retain your information for six years after full repayment of the overpayment has been made.

If the claim has an active fraud investigation we will retain all information until 6 years after the end of the fraud investigation and conclusion of any court action.

To view MVDC’s Data Retention Policy, visit www.molevalley.gov.uk.

Statutory Obligations to provide the personal data:

There is no statutory obligation on you to provide any personal data about you, however, if you do not your application cannot be considered further.

Automated Decision Making:

Depending on the data you have provided our commuter systems my automatically re-calculate your benefit entitlement. For example if you or someone in your household has a significant birthday. If this happens you can ask for one of our officers to look at the assessment to make sure it is correct.

Data Subject Rights:

From 25 May 2018 you will have some specific rights in respect of your personal data. These may include some or all of the following rights to:

• see what personal data about you MVDC holds at any time (subject to certain caveats, for example where third parties are identified);
• have MVDC correct any errors (if any) in the personal data it holds about you;
• request your personal data is erased (though this right will not apply where MVDC is processing your personal data because it is necessary to comply with a legal obligation);
• request processing of your personal data is restricted (this will only apply in certain situations, for example where its accuracy is contested, where the processing is unlawful and the you oppose its proposed erasure by MVDC, or where MVDC no longer needs to process the personal data, but it is required by you in connection with legal claims);
• object to the processing where the processing is necessary for a task carried out in the public interest or in the exercise of official authority vested in the data controller (though MVDC will still be able to continue with the processing in certain circumstances, such as if there are compelling grounds for the processing which over ride your interests).

Will the personal data be processed for a different purpose?

No. If MVDC needs to inform recipients about any action it has taken under the Data Protection Act then it will do so by placing a Notice on MVDC’s website informing the public of any relevant changes

If you are dissatisfied with how your personal data is processed by MVDC then you have the right to complain to the Information Commissioner who can be contacted at: Information Commissioner’s Office, Wycliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow SK9 5AF.

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