Tens of thousands of pensioners could miss out on the winter fuel payment this winter due to a growing backlog of new claims for pension credit.
Chancellor Rachel Reeves announced this summer that claims for the allowance, which is intended to help pensioners with energy bills, would be limited to people in receipt of pension credit and other means-tested benefits.
The change triggered a surge in the number of pension credit claims which has overwhelmed the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP).
Whitehall staff have been left with a pile-up of 91,075 unprocessed claims as of 18 November, Emma Reynolds, the pensions minister said.
Figures released by the DWP put the number closer to 150,000, however.
To deal with the backlog, the Government department has put 500 extra staff in place, but the risk remains that many claims will remain outstanding heading in to the new year.
This year, around 10 million pensioners will be stripped of the winter fuel allowance, which is worth between £200 and £300.
The decision to scrap the benefit was met with a great deal of anger but the Government hopes that the policy will help it cope with the £22bn fiscal black hole which Labour says was left behind by the Conservatives.
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Read MoreAfter the cuts were revealed on 29 July, the Government launched a campaign urging those entitled to pension credit to apply for it, so they do not miss out on the winter fuel payment.
Not all applications, once processed, are successful though.
A Freedom of Information request from wealth management firm Quilter has revealed that more pension credit claims are denied than granted.
Some 92,000 pension credit claims were rejected by the government between April and December this year while 91,000 claims were awarded.
This means over half of those applying will miss out on the winter fuel payment.
Data from the DWP shows that in the week of 18 November, the average processing time for a pension credit application was 65 working days, or 13 weeks, up from nine weeks at the end of July.
That average processing time, unless it has picked up, would mean eligible people who submitted an application in November or December would likely not receive their winter fuel payment – and backdated pension credit payment – until February or March 2025.
In August, DWP was processing around 4,500 claims per week but in the first half of November, it was getting through an average of around 9,000.
The official backlog figures only go up to the middle of November so there are likely to have been thousands more applications since then.
A Government spokesperson said: “Over a million pensioners will still receive the winter fuel payment, and our drive to boost pension credit take-up has seen applications more than double with over 40,000 more pensioners now receiving it, as well as the winter fuel payment.
“We have deployed additional staff to support processing applications, seeing a 51 per cent increase in the number of cleared claims since the Chancellor’s announcement.
“We continue to urge anyone who thinks they may be entitled to pension credit to check now, as all eligible claims can be backdated, and anyone who makes a successful claim before 21 December will receive their payment.”
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