MP fears DWP cuts will aid overseas pension fraud

The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) is disbanding an overseas team of pensions officers in Bangladesh, Pakistan, India and Yemen.

This comes after questions over the closures in the House of Commons from Eilidh Whiteford, MP for Banff and Buchan, to Work and Pensions Secretary Iain Duncan Smith (pictured).

Whiteford told IFAonline: "The DWP has a network of officers overseas where there are likely to be lots of recipients of UK benefits.

"We know that some are being closed in South Asia. How do you verify a claim for benefits in a country where you can buy any paperwork you want?

"I am concerned the government is closing part of its network down to save money without considering how much money these officers save by preventing fraud."

The DWP confirmed the team of eight people employed in the South Asian countries were not fraud investigators, but employed to collect documents and translate correspondence relating to UK state pensions being paid to recipients overseas.

The department has five staff members based in Spain who help to investigate fraud.

It confirmed it has no plans to disband the Spanish team.

A spokesperson for the DWP said: "DWP has to make considerable savings over the next three years.

"The trends of reducing caseload and improving infrastructure along with the introduction of additional security practices for all customers overseas meant reviewing activity at this time was appropriate.

"The review determined that whilst the overseas staff in Spain played an active role in fraud detection, there was no longer any compelling quantitative evidence to support a similar conclusion in the Indian sub-continent and Yemen.

"We decided not to continue and bring the processes in ISC and Yemen into line with those in the rest of the world."

According to DWP figures, the Spanish team has recovered overpayments of benefits to the value of £2.8m since 2008, and investigated 323 fraudulent cases in 2010/11.