THE rollout of Universal Credit is posing a serious risk to Wiltshire Council finances, officers have warned.

County Hall currently gets a large proportion of its council house rents direct from Housing Benefit. But under the new system the money goes to the tenant instead, as part of a monthly lump sum, paid in arrears.

“This is likely to increase the action taken against tenants for non-payment,” a report to councillors says.

And that will require more staffing and mean higher legal costs.

The council owns more than 5,000 homes, most of them in Salisbury and south Wiltshire.

By January there were 354 tenants on Universal Credit (UC), and 131 of them were more than six weeks behind with their rent.

The report says this was partly due to the waiting period that people face without any money coming in as they are being switched to the new benefit.

But many were already in arrears anyway.

Before they went on to UC they had rent arrears of £97,973.

These have since increased by 104 per cent, to £199,837.

The council has tenancy sustainment officers who can help people manage their money and set up direct payment plans for the most vulnerable.

But when it comes to claiming the new benefit online, it says, there are problems for people in rural areas without access to computers, and for those who lack literacy and numeracy skills.

The council’s action strategy includes increasing the number of tenants paying by direct debit.

To help reduce payment delays, it has designed a form for tenants to take to job centre interviews setting out their liabilities.

It now carries out pre-tenancy credit checks, and has signed up to a system allowing tenants who pay on time to boost their credit score.

But it concludes there are “still significant concerns” about future rent collection, “on the assumption that a large proportion of income currently derived from Housing Benefit will be at risk.”