Changes in your circumstances

It's important to tell us straight away.

Tell us about a change in circumstances

If you can't complete the form, contact us:

• Phone: 020 7527 4990
• Email: benefits.service@islington.gov.uk

What you need to tell us about

You need to tell us about any change that could affect your benefit. Changes can include:

• changes to your (or your partner's) income, benefits, capital or savings 
• your rent going up or down (if you are a council tenant you don’t need to tell us about any rent changes)
• changing your address
• the number of people in your home changing
• anyone who lives with you starting or stopping work
• changes to the income of someone who lives with you
• a child leaving school
• leaving your home temporarily
• going abroad, outside of Great Britain
• you (or your partner) becoming or stopping being a student
• you (or your partner) claiming Universal Credit 

We cannot list all the changes in circumstances that you should tell us about. If you're not sure whether we need to know, please tell us anyway.

Why it's important

The law says you must tell us if there is any change to the information we have used to calculate your housing benefit or council tax support.

You should tell us straight away when a changes happens. If you delay telling us about a change, we may continue to pay you benefit that you are not entitled to and you could be overpaid. We will expect you to pay back any benefit that you are overpaid.

If you take more than a month to tell us about a change that entitles you to more benefit, we can usually only increase your benefit from the week after the date you tell us about the change.

If you don’t report a change that you know will affect your benefit, and you don’t have a good reason for this, you are committing a criminal offence, just as if you gave us false information or concealed the truth.