Benefit Combination statistics: background information note

Question 1

1.  Background

Accepted Answer

The aim of the Benefit Combination statistics is to provide a count of the number of individuals claiming a DWP benefit in total (i.e. only counting each individual claimant once). They are also to show the key combinations of benefits claimed.

These statistics should only be used for looking at the whole, combined picture for DWP benefit claimants. For more complete and detailed data on individual benefits, see the individual publications for separate benefits.

From August 2021 onwards, figures published on Stat Xplore are presented separately for England & Wales (plus abroad and unknown) and Scotland. This is due to changes for benefits in Scotland arising from Scottish Devolution. Users can obtain figures for Great Britain by adding together the England & Wales and Scotland totals.

The Benefit Combination statistics cover the following DWP paid or administered benefits:

Attendance Allowance (AA)
Bereavement Benefit (BB)
Bereavement Support Payment (BSP)
Carer’s Allowance (CA)
Disability Living Allowance (DLA)
Employment and Support Allowance (ESA)
Housing Benefit (HB)
Incapacity Benefit (IB)
Industrial Injuries Disablement Benefit (IIDB)
Income Support (IS)
Jobseeker’s Allowance (JSA)
Pension Credit (PC)
Personal Independence Payment (PIP)
Severe Disablement Allowance (SDA)
State Pension (SP)
Universal Credit (UC)
Widow’s Benefit (WB)

For household level benefits (UC, PC and HB), both the main claimant and partner (if applicable) are included in the statistics as separate individuals. This differs from publication elsewhere of PC and HB statistics where figures show number of claims regardless of whether for a single person or a couple. An individual is not counted as a benefit claimant if they are a beneficiary of another person’s benefit claim but are not claiming any benefit in their own right.

HMRC administered benefits such as Tax Credits and Child Benefit are NOT included in the statistics.

Current Benefit Combinations statistics also do not include Scottish benefits:

Carer’s Allowance Supplement
Child Disability Payment
Adult Disability Payment

Question 2

2.  Definitions

Accepted Answer

In the Benefit Combination statistics, some terms are defined differently than in the individual published statistics for specific benefits, and some benefits are grouped together:

2.1 Claimant

A DWP benefit claimant is defined for the purposes of these statistics as the individual who is claiming benefit on their own behalf, or in the case of Universal Credit, Pension Credit and Housing Benefit, an individual who is part of a single or couple claim for benefit. An individual is not counted as a benefit claimant if they are a beneficiary of another person’s benefit claim but are not claiming any benefit in their own right.

2.2 Reference date

These statistics represent the situation at a point in time, called the reference date. The reference date is given as a specific month but due to variation across the systems and methodologies within the data sources for different benefits, the point within a given month does vary across benefits. For almost all benefits, the reference date used is the last day of the month. However, for Housing Benefit (HB) and Universal Credit (UC) the date that is used is the 2nd Thursday of the month. Thus in a small number of cases, benefit combinations will reflect different claim start and end dates:

for example, if an individual starts new claims for both JSA and HB after the 2nd Thursday of a month, the JSA data with reference date at the end of the month will show the individual to be claiming JSA in that month, but the HB data with reference date 2nd Thursday will not show the individual to be claiming in that month
alternatively, if an individual stops claiming both JSA and HB after the 2nd Thursday of a month, the JSA data with reference date at the end of the month will not show the individual to be claiming JSA in that month, but the HB data with reference date 2nd Thursday will show the individual to be claiming in that month

2.3 Caseload

Number of individuals on the benefit caseload at the reference date. For most benefits, figures show the number of people in receipt of payment. Some benefits however also include those with entitlement where the payment has been suspended, for example if they are in hospital. Benefits where both entitlement and allowance are included are:

Carer’s Allowance (CA)
Disability Living Allowance (DLA)
Attendance Allowance (AA)
some Personal Independence Payment (PIP) cases

2.4 PIP/DLA/AA

Disability Living Allowance (DLA) is a benefit for people who became disabled before they reached state pension age and who need assistance with personal care or mobility. From 8 April 2013 DWP started to replace DLA for working age people with Personal Independence Payment (PIP), and all new claims are now made to PIP rather than DLA, while existing DLA claimants aged less than 65 on 8 April 2013 are gradually being invited to switch to PIP. However, people can continue to receive PIP or DLA after reaching state pension age if they continue to satisfy the entitlement conditions.

Attendance Allowance (AA) is a benefit for people at state pension age or over who are so severely disabled that they need a great deal of help with personal care or supervision. Essentially these three benefits each offer help for similar sets of circumstances, although under slightly different qualifying conditions. As such they have been banded together and the benefit combinations statistics simply show PIP/DLA for Working Age individuals, or PIP/DLA/AA for State Pension Age individuals, where the individual could be on any of the benefits shown at the reference date.

People who claim PIP, DLA or AA are paid at different rates depending on the level of help or support needed. PIP and DLA each have two components, one to help with Daily Living (Care Award for DLA) and the other to help with Mobility. An individual may be awarded one or both components, and if only one has been awarded the other will show a level of “Nil”. AA has a single component which is equivalent to Daily Living, and there is no mobility component, so all mobility awards for AA will show as “Nil”. The mechanisms by which the award levels are decided differ from one benefit to another, but the amounts paid are equivalent across all three (with the exception of DLA Lowest Care component which has no equivalent in PIP or AA).

Benefit Award Details (PIP, DLA or AA)

Personal Independence Payment (PIP)

For each component, a list of activities are scored depending on how much support, and the type of support, the clamant needs to do the activity. The scores for the activities are added together to give a total for each component. Each component may be awarded at one of two rates:

Enhanced – if their scores add up to 12 points or more
Standard – if they score between 8 and 11 points
Nil – if they score less than 8 points

Disability Living Allowance (DLA)

The DLA Care component is for people who have needed help with personal care for at least 3 months and are likely to go on needing that help for at least a further 6 month. It is awarded at one of three rates:

Highest (equivalent to PIP Enhanced) – for people who need help or supervision throughout both day and night, or who are terminally ill
Middle (equivalent to PIP Standard) – for people who need frequent help or constant supervision during the day, supervision at night or someone to help while on dialysis
Lowest (no equivalent on PIP or AA) – for people who need help for some of the day or with preparing cooked meals
Nil – if the care component is not awarded

The DLA mobility component is for people who have had walking difficulties for at least 3 months and are likely to continue to have those difficulties for at least a further 6 months. It is awarded at two rates:

Higher (equivalent to PIP Enhanced) – for people who are physically unable, or virtually unable, to walk
Lower (equivalent to PIP Standard) – for people who can walk, but need guidance or supervision from another person when walking out of doors on unfamiliar routes
Nil – if the mobility are component is not awarded

Attendance Allowance (AA)

AA has a single component which is equivalent to Daily Living on PIP or Care component on DLA. It is awarded at two rates:

Higher (equivalent to PIP Enhanced) – for people who need help or supervision throughout both day and night, or who are terminally ill
Lower (equivalent to PIP Standard) – for people who need frequent help or constant supervision during the day, or supervision at night

As there is no mobility component for AA, all AA mobility awards will appear as Nil.

2.5 INCAP

The Benefit Combination statistics refer to INCAP which is short hand for ESA/IB/SDA/IS(IB). Incapacity Benefit (IB), Severe Disablement Allowance (SDA) (for those under SPA), and Income Support for those claiming on the basis of incapacity (IS(IB)) closed to new claimants from 2008, with existing claimants migrated to Employment and Support Allowance (ESA) on a rolling program since that date. Migration is not yet fully completed. Essentially these four benefits each offer help for similar sets of circumstances, although under slightly different qualifying conditions. As such they have been banded together and the benefit combinations statistics simply show INCAP, where at the reference date the individual could be on any of ESA; IB and/or SDA (separately or in combination); and IS where IB and/or SDA is also in payment.

2.6 IIDB

As with the published IIDB data, IIDB refers to those who claim one or more of the following:

Industrial Injuries Disablement Benefit
Reduced Earnings Allowance
Retirement Allowance

2.7 IS

Income Support for those claiming on the basis of incapacity (IS(IB)) closed to new claimants from 2008, with existing claimants migrated to Employment and Support Allowance (ESA) on a rolling program since that date. Migration is not yet fully completed. Benefit Combination statistics include IS(IB) cases in the INCAP category. Those claiming Income Support on the basis of something other than incapacity (for example carers, lone parents) are shown as IS within these statistics.

2.8 UC

Universal Credit was introduced in April 2013 in certain pathfinder areas of North West England. Since October 2013, it has progressively been rolled out to other areas. It is now available in all Jobcentre Plus areas to single claimants, and is being expanded across the country to include all claimant types. The following benefits will be replaced as Universal Credit rolls out:

Income-based Jobseeker’s Allowance
Income-related Employment and Support Allowance
Income Support
Working Tax Credit
Child Tax Credit and Housing Benefit

An individual claiming Universal Credit may have to do work-related activity in order to get full entitlement to Universal Credit. Each eligible adult will fall into one of six conditionality regimes based on their capability and circumstances. The benefit combination statistics band together certain conditionality regimes and present UC claims as belonging to one of four categories:

UC Out-of-work
UC No Work Requirements
UC Working
and UC unknown

UC Out-of-work comprises:

searching for work (Not working, or with very low earnings. Claimant is required to take action to secure work - or more / better paid work. The Work Coach supports them to plan their work search and preparation activity)
planning for work (Expected to work in the future. Lone parent / lead carer of child aged 1 (or aged 1-2 prior to April 2017). Claimant required to attend periodic interviews to plan for their return to work)
preparing for work (Expected to start preparing for future even with limited capability for work at the present time or a child aged 2 (or aged 3-4 prior to April 2017), the claimant is expected to take reasonable steps to prepare for work including Work Focused Interview)

UC No Work Requirements comprises:

those who are not expected to work at present, such as those for whom Health or caring responsibility prevents claimant from working or preparing for work

UC Working comprises:

working – with requirements (In work but could earn more, or not working but has a partner with low earnings)
working – no requirements (Individual or household earnings over the level at which conditionality applies. Required to inform DWP of changes of circumstances, particularly if at risk of decreasing earnings or losing job)

UC Unknown comprises:

those where conditionality is not recorded on the source systems or is not available prior to April 2015

From February 2024 an additional field, ‘UC Conditionality Regime’, has been added to the statistics to allow users to tabulate Stat-Xplore data by the six individual conditionality regimes. This is in addition to the UC benefit field breakdown, showing the four conditionality categories described above.

Figures in this, and future DWP publications, are affected by the introduction of Universal Credit (UC). The main changes are:

increasing number of individuals claiming UC with corresponding decreasing number of individuals claiming JSA, ESA, IS and HB
increasing number of individuals claiming UC who would previously have claimed Working Tax Credit and/or Child Tax Credit and who would not have appeared in these statistics until their UC claim began

2.8.1 UC Health

When a customer makes a claim for Universal Credit they will be asked if they have a mental/physical health condition or a disability which prevents, or limits, their ability to work. When a claimant declares they have a restricted ability to work due to their health condition, and DWP receives medical evidence in support of the claim, the department places the claimant on UC Health. Claimants who are in work can also be placed on UC Health if they report a health condition that limits the amount of work they can do. Claimants who have ongoing health conditions that stop them from working must continue to provide medical evidence until they receive their WCA outcome. If a claimant stops sending medical evidence (or it expires), they will leave UC Health.

Once the medical evidence is reviewed, DWP considers whether the claimant is eligible for a Work Capability Assessment (WCA) referral. If so, the referral is sent to the Centre for Health and Disability Assessments (CHDA) and the Health Transformation Programme (HTP) who complete WCAs for the DWP.

The WCA is used to find out how much a claimant’s health condition or disability affects their ability to work. It assesses what they can do, as well as what they can’t do. DWP have responsibility for making the final assessment decisions based on the WCA outcome report, together with any other relevant health-related evidence. The decision can be challenged by raising Mandatory Reconsiderations and Appeals.

There are three WCA outcomes:

Limited Capability for Work (Claimant’s capability for work is limited by their physical or mental condition and it is not reasonable to require them to work right away. They can prepare for work with the aim of working at some time in the future)
Limited Capability for Work and Work-Related Activity (The claimant’s health condition is such that they are not expected to look for work or to prepare for work, though they can volunteer)
No Limited Capability for Work (If a claimant is found fit for work and their condition is the same, or substantially the same as the condition they were suffering before the WCA, they need to look for work that is suitable for their health condition, and be prepared to work to keep getting Universal Credit)

If the WCA outcome finds that the individual does not have limited capability for work, so is fit for work, they will show in the Benefit Combination Statistics as “Not on UC health journey” from the point in time where that decision is recorded in the UC Health Caseload statistics.

2.9 Benefit Combinations

The combinations of benefits that an individual can claim are many and varied. There are too many to usefully list them all in a single variable, although the fields for separate benefits on Stat-Xplore can be used to find any specific combination if required. Instead, three fields have been created to show the most common combinations that occur for each of three separate groupings:

Out of Work
State Pension Age
Working Age

In each case, the categories of these fields are mutually exclusive and therefore can be summed without double counting.

2.10 Benefit Combination (Out of Work)

The Out of Work benefit combinations cover a specific list of out-of-work benefits. This measure enables users to bridge the gap between previously published Working Age Client Group NOMIS data and the benefit combination statistics in Stat-Xplore. For the purposes of this field, out-of-work benefits are defined as:

Jobseeker’s Allowance (JSA)
Employment and Support Allowance (ESA)
Incapacity Benefit (IB)
Severe Disablement Allowance (SDA)
Income Support (IS) where Carer’s Allowance (CA) not also in payment
Pension Credit (PC) where Carer’s Allowance (CA) not also in payment
Universal Credit Out of Work (UC OOW) where conditionality regime is one of Searching for Work, Preparing for Work or Planning for Work.
Universal Credit No Work Requirements (UC NWR) where conditionality regime is No Work Requirements

All recipients of any of the out-of-work benefits are included in one of the categories for this field and may or may not be additionally in receipt of other benefits not listed here.

The only exception is for data from February 2013 to February 2019, in cases where an individual claims Pension Credit (PC) in combination with one or more of the other out of work benefits. For this date range, the Out of Work benefit combinations only include Pension Credit when not claimed alongside any of the other Out of Work benefits (or Carer’s Allowance). This leads to a small undercount in Out of Work benefit claimant totals – 0.1% for data as at February 2019, having steadily reduced from 1.7% in February 2013. For the period May 2019 onwards, development work has been completed to remove this exception, and all Out of Work benefit combinations are available

2.11 Benefit Combinations (State Pension Age)

The SPA benefit combinations cover at least 95% of SPA claimants, with the remainder included in a catch all ‘other’ category. For each benefit combination category shown, only the specific combination of benefits is claimed. More complex combinations that include those benefits in a particular category along with additional benefits will appear either in their own category or in the ‘other’ category.

For example:

the category showing SP & PC includes only individuals who claim State Pension and Pension Credit and none of the other benefits
an individual who claims State Pension and Pension Credit and also Housing Benefit would appear in the SP & PC & HB category
whereas an individual who claims State Pension and Pension Credit and also Housing Benefit and Industrial Injuries Disablement Benefit would appear in the ‘other’ category

2.12 Benefit Combinations (Working Age)

The WA benefit combinations cover at least 95% of WA claimants, with the remainder included in a catch all ‘other’ category. For each benefit combination category shown, only the specific combination of benefits is claimed. More complex combinations that include those benefits in a particular category along with additional benefits will appear either in their own category or in the ‘other’ category.

For example:

the category showing HB & IS includes only individuals who claim Housing Benefit and Income Support and none of the other benefits
an individual who claims Housing Benefit and Income Support and also Carer’s Allowance would appear in the HB & IS & CA category
whereas an individual who claims Housing Benefit and Income Support and also Carer’s Allowance and Personal Independence Payment would appear in the ‘other’ category

Question 3

3.  Explanation of key differences

Accepted Answer

This section covers key differences between the caseloads that can be obtained through the Benefit Combination statistics and the published caseloads.

3.1 Methodological differences – PIP

The published PIP statistics do not remove duplicate cases by NINO, but by Warehouse ID (WH_PIP_ID). Administrative complications have led to a very small number of cases where the same NINO is attached to more than one WH_PIP_ID. However, in order for the sorting and merging step 2 to work correctly we must first remove any duplicate records by NINO during step 1. This means that the benefit combination statistics show slightly fewer people claiming PIP at a given point in time than the official PIP statistics.

However, the difference is insignificant – as at May 2020, there were 1,300 fewer cases in the combined benefit dataset than the PIP dataset, which is 0.05% of the PIP caseload.

Child Disability Payment is the first of the application-based disability benefits to be introduced by the Scottish Government. It replaces Disability Living Allowance for children living in Scotland. From July 2021, new applications were taken in Scotland for Child Disability Payment for children under 16 that live in the pilot areas of Dundee City, Na h-Eileanan Siar and Perth and Kinross. On 22 November 2021, Child Disability Payment launched nationwide to all new applicants living in Scotland.

The Disability Living Allowance figures presented to the end of August 2021 overlaps with the launch of Child Disability Payment in the pilot areas in Scotland detailed above. This overlap accounts for approximately five weeks where new applications for Child Disability Payment in these areas were taken. Data on applications and payments made for this time period is available. Due to the short time period and limited areas that applicants could apply from, the number of applications received were small and have had a very limited impact on Disability Living Allowance for child numbers.

More information on Scottish Devolution is recorded in section 4.

3.2 Methodological differences – HB

The published HB statistics give the number of HB claims at a point in time. Claims may be for individual (single) people or for couples, and the HB publication dataset contains one row per claim with the NINO of the main claimant but also gives the NINO of the partner (if there is one) in a separate field.

In order to create a dataset with one row per individual (for all individuals in the claim whether they are the main claimant or the partner), during step 1 every row with the partner NINO populated is copied and appended back on to the dataset with the NINO field populated by the partner NINO.

It is possible to get a figure for number of individuals from the published HB statistics by looking at the ‘gender’ variable, where the gender for the claim is recorded as male/female for single claims and ‘couple’ for couple claims. However, there are some discrepancies in the HB dataset between the gender variable and whether the partner NINO is populated.

in May 2020, 1,700 cases were recorded as a couple according to the ‘gender’ classification but had no partner NINO, and 0 male and 1 female individuals were recorded as single claims but did have a partner NINO recorded

Published HB figures also allow an individual to be in more than one claim at the same point in time, and counts each as a separate claim. The benefit combinations dataset removes duplicates since the dataset counts each individual once and records whether they are on HB or not at the caseload date.

in May 2020, there were 2,000 duplicate NINO records removed from the benefit combinations individual dataset
note that these issues interact with one another, as some of the duplicates being removed are individuals who appear as the main claimant on one record and the partner on another. The difference is therefore smaller than 1,700+2,000 (=3,700)

Further differences between published HB statistics and Benefit Combinations HB figures are caused by cleaning rules for some overlapping HB and UC claims, which are explained in section 3.6.

3.3 Methodological differences – IIDB

The Benefit Combinations IIDB caseload estimates the caseload of individuals who were claiming Industrial Injuries Disablement Benefit (as defined in section 2.6) as at the last day of the calendar month. The source IIDB data (from the Industrial Injuries Disablement Benefit system 100% data) used for Benefit Combination statistics shows IIDB claimants at a point five months previous to the last day of the Benefit Combinations calendar month. To adjust for this lag, data from the Customer Information System (CIS) showing deaths has been used to be remove cases for individuals known to have died between the IIDB time point and the Benefit Combinations time point.

The published IIDB caseload for March 2020 was 265,000. For February 2020, the Benefit Combinations IIDB caseload (estimated using the latest published IIDB caseload at the time (from September 2019) minus those who were known to have died) was 264,000, which represents a 0.4% undercount (1,100 fewer people) of the March 2020 caseload.

Please note that as this method does not account for people who leave IIDB for any reason other than death or for those who join the caseload within the period, results in the estimate consistently undercount the published IIDB figures (corresponding the one month later) by 0.1% to 1.1%. Note further that these estimates, while imperfect, are consistently closer to the IIDB caseload at the time of publishing than if the most recently available IIDB data were used when publishing the Benefit Combinations.

Also note that no IIDB data was published in June 2015 due to a data processing deficiency. Accordingly, the March 2015 IIDB data was used when estimating both the August 2015 and November 2015 Benefit Combinations IIDB caseloads.

3.4 Methodological differences – UC Health

The number of people on UC Health comprises those with a restricted ability to work supported by acceptable medical evidence (pre-Work Capability Assessment) or with a Limited Capability for Work/Limited Capability for Work Related Activity outcome.

In order to generate the Benefit Combinations UC Health caseload, individuals on UC Health are matched by NINO to those on the Universal Credit caseload. Due to timing differences in the two datasets, there are a small number of people who do not appear on the UC caseload. In May 2023, this affected 2,300 people, representing 0.1% of the Universal Credit Health caseload.

3.5 Age and Gender

In most existing published data series for individual benefits, the age and gender are published as recorded on the source system for that benefit. However, the combined benefit dataset uses the Customer Information System (CIS) record for each NINO to bring through gender and date of birth.

In a small proportion of cases, a CIS record cannot be found. (For May 2020, 0.03% of records overall, with most benefits less than 0.01%, PIP/UC/IIBD between 0.01% and 0.05%, and HB 0.11%). Where this occurs, a hierarchy is applied to populate the date of birth and gender with that recorded on the source benefit dataset as follows:

if CIS not found, use UC
then PIP
then the combined National Statistics dataset for all of AA/BB/CA/DLA/ESA/IB/IS/JSA/PC/SDA/SP/WB
then BSP
then IIDB
then HB

This hierarchy still leaves a tiny proportion of cases where date of birth and gender are not known – these tend to be individuals claiming UC.

There are differences between the gender and date of birth as recorded on CIS, compared to that recorded on the individual benefit systems. For May 2020:

ages differ by less than 0.2% for any benefit individually, ranging between 0.04% or less for most benefits and 0.14% for PIP
genders differ less than ages – the highest difference is for PIP at 0.03%

There are also differences in the time points that difference benefits use to calculate the age at caseload based on date of birth:

legacy benefit (AA/BB/CA/DLA/ESA/IB/IS/JSA/PC/SDA/SP/WB) and IIDB data calculates age as at the end of the caseload month
PIP calculates age as at the start of the caseload month
UC and HB calculate age as at the 2nd Thursday of the month

The combined benefit dataset calculates age as at the end of the caseload month in order to maximise the number of benefits for which the methodology is the same, but this means that there are slight differences across age bands for HB, PIP and UC.

3.6 Cleaning

Under some circumstances (such as administrative transitions between different systems, or differences in reference date across different sources) an individual appears in the raw data to be claiming a combination of benefits that should not be possible – for example Universal Credit and IS. Cleaning rules are therefore applied to ensure that the published figures do not contain these “illegal combinations”.

The rules that are applied are:

if the person appears to be on UC then we do not allow them to also be on any of IS, IB, SDA so any markers for these 3 benefits are set to blank
if a person appears to be on UC and HB then we check to see if the HB claim is ongoing for more than 14 days beyond the HB caseload date, and if not then the HB marker is set to blank
if a person appears to be on UC as well as a non-contributory based payment type for ESA, then we set the ESA payment type to “unknown/missing”

The number of cases affected by this cleaning is small and accounts for no more than 1% of the total caseload for each affected benefit or group of benefits. For the caseload at May 2023, the number of cases cleaned is shown in the following table.

Benefit	Cases cleaned	Due to overlap with	% of total caseload cleaned
IS	100	UC	0.1%
INCAP (ESA/IB/SDA)	3,300	UC (IS/IB/SDA cases)	0.2%
HB	17,000	UC	0.6%
ESA (non-contributory payment type set to “unknown”)	850	UC	0.1%

Question 4

4.  Scottish Devolution

Accepted Answer

4.1 Benefit changes in Scotland

The Scotland Act 2016 gives Scottish Parliament powers over a number of social security benefits which had been administered to Scottish claimants by the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP). From 1 April 2020, executive competency for DLA, PIP, AA, SDA and IIDB transferred from DWP to Social Security Scotland, the executive agency of Scottish Government which is responsible for delivering social security benefits for Scotland. Claims continued to be administered by DWP on Social Security Scotland’s behalf during an interim transitional period.

Carer’s Allowance became the first benefit for which executive competence transferred to the Scottish Government in 2018. DWP is administering Carer’s Allowance on behalf of Scottish Ministers until the introduction of Carer’s Assistance, which will replace it. However, Social Security Scotland is delivering Carer’s Allowance Supplement for which recipients of Carer’s Allowance who are resident in Scotland are eligible. Benefit Combination statistics in this release do not include data on Carer’s Allowance Supplement.

Child Disability Payment (CDP) has been introduced in Scotland to replace DLA for those aged under 16. New claims for CDP began in certain areas of Scotland in July 2021 and for the whole of Scotland from November 2021. The process of transferring existing claimants who live in Scotland from child DLA to CDP is a gradual and automatic. It began in Autumn 2021 and is expected to finish in Spring 2023.

Adult Disability Payment (ADP) has been introduced in Scotland to replace PIP and DLA for those aged between 16 and state pension age. New claims for ADP began in certain areas of Scotland in March 2022 and gradually extended to the whole of Scotland by 29th August 2022. For existing PIP and DLA claimants who live in Scotland, Social Security Scotland began to move clients to ADP from Summer 2022.

In the future, there are plans to replace AA with Pension Age Disability Payment and CA with Carer’s Assistance in Scotland.

More information on Scottish Devolution can be found in the background information note of the DWP Benefit Statistical Summary.

4.2 Presentation of Benefit Combinations in Scotland

For Benefit Combinations statistics, one implication of the changes for Scottish benefits due to devolution is that some of the benefits claimed by people residing in Scotland are now being replaced by new benefits, others are still administered by DWP although policy is already owned by the Scottish government, and others remain under DWP policy ownership with no current plans for change. This means that the common combinations of DWP administered benefits in Scotland are expected to change over the coming years.

The Benefit Combinations data in Stat Xplore has therefore been split. For data points up to and including May 2021, data for the whole of Great Britain is available in a single series. From August 2021 onwards, there are two series, one containing England and Wales (and also including abroad and unknown cases) and the other containing Scotland on its own. This will allow the fields for Benefit Combinations (Working Age or State Pension Age) to be adjusted when necessary in the future to reflect the changing picture of common benefit combinations in Scotland whilst leaving England and Wales unaffected.

Users who require a Great Britain figure for time points from August 2021 onwards can add together the England & Wales and Scotland series but must understand that the Scottish series does not include benefits administered by Scotland (Child Disability Payment and Adult Disability Payment), though it does include residual PIP and DLA claims which have not yet transferred to the new Scottish benefits.

Question 5

5.  Benefit Combinations visuals

Accepted Answer

The Benefit Combinations section of the Benefit Statistical Summary release contains illustrative diagrams known as Euler diagrams, included to demonstrate the complexity of the situation for many claimants.

An Euler (pronounced OY-lər) diagram is a means of representing sets and their relationships. They typically involve overlapping shapes, and may be scaled, such that the area of the shape is proportional to the number of elements it contains. They are particularly useful for explaining complex hierarchies and overlapping definitions. They are often confused with Venn diagrams. Unlike Venn diagrams, which show all possible relations between different sets, the Euler diagram shows only relevant relationships.

The Euler diagrams for the Benefit Combinations statistics are created using software which sizes and positions overlapping circles to represent the areas of each overlapping section as accurately as possible. However, it is not possible to represent every single combination that occurs in the data in a 2 dimensional diagram of overlapping circles, and it is not always possible for the areas to be exactly proportional to the number of cases for each combination.

5.1 WA Euler Diagram

The following groups are included in the WA Euler diagram, and the circles are scaled in proportion to the size of each group:

UC Out of Work
PIP/DLA
HB
INCAP
UC Working
CA
UC No Work Requirements
JSA
IS
OTHER comprising BB, IIDB, PC, WB plus any benefits usually only claimed by those of State Pension Age

Specific overlaps are included and the circles on the diagram are positioned to scale the size of the overlaps as closely as possible to the sizes of the groups:

HB & PIP/DLA
HB & INCAP
PIP/DLA & INCAP
JSA & HB
IS & HB
CA & HB
IS & CA
HB & OTHER
CA & UC NO WORK REQUIREMENTS
PIP/DLA & UC OUT OF WORK
PIP/DLA & UC WORKING
UC NO WORK REQUIREMENTS & HB
PIP/DLA & UC NO WORK REQUIREMENTS
HB & PIP/DLA & INCAP
HB & CA & IS
CA & UC NO WORK REQUIREMENTS & HB
PIP/DLA & UC NO WORK REQUIREMENTS & HB

These combinations (including the single benefits on their own) account for 95% of all WA claimants. The remaining 5% claim another combination that is not shown.

5.2 SPA Euler Diagram

The following groups are included in the SPA Euler diagram, and the circles are scaled in proportion to the size of each group:

SP
AA/PIP/DLA
HB
PC
CA
IIDB

The diagram does not show those on other benefits, comprising BB, WB plus any benefits usually only claimed by those of Working Age

Specific overlaps are included and the circles on the diagram are positioned to scale the size of the overlaps as closely as possible to the sizes of the groups:

SP & AA/PIP/DLA
SP & PC
SP & HB
SP & CA
SP & IIDB
SP & AA/PIP/DLA & HB
SP & AA/PIP/DLA & PC
SP & PC & HB
SP & AA/PIP/DLA & IIDB
SP & AA/PIP/DLA & CA
SP & PC & CA
SP & AA/PIP/DLA & PC & HB
SP & AA/PIP/DLA & PC & CA

These combinations (including the single benefits on their own) account for 99% of all SPA claimants. The remaining 1% claim another combination that is not shown.

Question 6

6.  Status of the statistics

Accepted Answer

As of 15 August 2023, these statistics are now classed as ‘official statistics’.

In Spring 2023, the Chief Statistician for DWP led an internal review of all experimental official statistics produced by DWP. This is in line with the Code of Practice for Official Statistics. The review found that it was appropriate to remove the experimental label from this publication because it was concluded that the statistics are suitable and of public value.

Question 7

7.  Disclosure control

Accepted Answer

The Code of Practice for Statistics (CoP), specifically Principle T6: Data Governance set out principles for how we protect data on individuals from being disclosed.

Introduced Random Error

Figures in this publication are derived from Stat-Xplore and are subject to Introduced Random Error. This is to ensure that no data is released which could risk the identification of individuals.

Many classifications used within Benefit Combinations statistics have an uneven distribution of data throughout their categories, in particular across geographical areas. When geographical area is cross-tabulated with other breakdowns, such as age, gender and family type, the number in the table cell could be small. These small numbers increase the risk of identifying individuals in the statistics.

Even when variables are more evenly distributed in the classifications, the problem still occurs. The more detailed the classifications, and the more of them that are applied in constructing a table, the greater the incidence of very small cells.

Care is taken in the specification of tables to minimise the risk of identifying individuals. In addition, a technique has been developed to randomly adjust cell values. Random adjustment of the data is considered to be the most satisfactory technique for avoiding the release of identifiable data. When the technique is applied, all cells may be slightly adjusted to prevent any identifiable data being exposed. These adjustments result in small introduced random errors. However, the information value of the table as a whole is not impaired. The technique allows very large tables, for which there is a strong customer demand, to be produced even though they contain numbers of very small cells.

It is not possible to determine which individual figures have been affected by random error adjustments, but the small variance which may be associated with derived totals can, for the most part, be ignored.

No reliance should be placed on small cells as they are impacted by random adjustment, respondent and processing errors.

Many different classifications are used in Benefit Combinations statistics tables and the tables are produced for a variety of geographical areas. The effect of the introduced random error is minimised if the statistic required is found direct from a tabulation rather than from aggregating more finely classified data.

Similarly, rather than aggregating data from small areas to obtain statistics about a larger standard geographic area, published data for the larger area should be used wherever possible.

When calculating proportions, percentages or ratios from cross-classified or small area tables, the random error introduced can be ignored except when very small cells are involved, in which case the impact on percentages and ratios can be significant.

Other published sources of individual benefit data have varying methods of disclosure control – rounding, perturbation and use of rating factors. This can lead to differences when comparing the published figures across the sources, of up to a few hundred cases.

The figures quoted within this background information note and the release it accompanies generally adhere to standard DWP rounding policy as shown in the following table.

From	To	Rounded to nearest
0	1,000	10
1,001	10,000	100
10,001	100,000	1,000
100,001	1,000,000	10,000
1,000,001	10,000,000	100,000
10,000,001	100,000,000	1,000,000

All changes, percentage changes and totals are calculated prior to rounding.

While we aim to adhere to the rounding policy there are some rare occasions where this policy prevents realistic comparison of two figures where there are small differences. In such cases additional significant figures may be used.

Question 8

8.  Changes to the series

Accepted Answer

Date of change	Description of change	Impact of change
Aug 2017	Client Stats published benefit combinations as part of the QBS. Publication took the form of a page in the QBS itself and included Euler diagram and time series chart, and a set of Excel tables giving totals for working age and state pension age groups of benefit claimants, by main benefit combinations quarterly from Feb-13 to Feb-17 and broken down by age and gender for the latest quarter.	Benefit Combinations data now available
Nov 2017	Figures were updated up to May-17 and a new table was added to the Excel publication giving a breakdown of Out of Work benefits, giving users a comparable series to the old “Key Out of Work Benefits” series.	New variable now available
Feb 2018	Figures were updated to Aug-17 and data was made available through Stat-Xplore for the first time - giving national level figures and breakdowns by age, gender and combination of benefits claimed.	Benefit Combinations data now more accessible and have more utility
May 2018	Figures were updated to Nov-17 and the Stat-Xplore data was extended to allow breakdowns by geographical area (down to Local Authority & Parliamentary Constituency) and by individual benefit, which allows cross-tabulation of specific pairs of benefits for the first time. Publication of Excel tables was discontinued.	Benefit Combinations data has more utility
Feb 2021	IIDB added to Benefit Combinations	Benefit Combinations statistics now contain 16 benefits and give more combinations than before, giving a more complete picture of all DWP administrative benefit claimants. Nearly 4 out of 5 IIDB claimants also claim other benefits (79% in August 2020) and were included as individuals in the statistics already, though without their IIDB claim identified. However, between 50,000 and 70,000 claimants in each quarter claim IIDB on its own and so had not previously been captured in overall counts of benefit claimants.
Feb 2021	Variable added to identify how many benefits an individual is claiming	Breaking down the data by number of benefits an individual claims is now possible
Feb 2021	Child DLA cases (for those aged under 16) for now included	520,000 (as of May 2020) individual claimants added, giving a more complete picture of all DWP administrated benefit claimants
Feb 2021	UC No-Work-Requirements now included in Out of Work groupings	Those who claim UC with No-Work-Requirements conceptually belong in the Out of Work grouping although they were previously not included. This increases the number of individuals counted as Out of Work by 850,000 (15%) as of May 2020, compared to the previous measure.
Feb 2021	Suspended SP cases now removed (since November 2017)	In May 2020, 17,000 suspended SP cases were removed to align with published SP data.
Feb 2021	Previously, cases claiming UC and HB at the same time were all cleaned off the HB caseload. This rule has been amended such that only those who are not on the HB caseload two weeks after the HB date are removed from the HB caseload (on the assumption that these are in the process of transferring from HB to UC), whilst all other cases remain showing concurrent UC and HB claims.	Under the previous cleaning rules, for May 2020 150,000 cases would have been cleaned off the HB caseload (a 4% undercount compared to the published figures). Now, only 17,000 cases are cleaned off the HB caseload (a 0.5% undercount compared to the published HB figures, but closer to the true HB caseload at the end of the month than if no cleaning was applied) .
Feb 2021	Most common combinations re-evaluated and updated	As of May 2020, 95% of working age claimants were included in the 24 most commonly occurring working age combinations. Similarly, 97% of state pension claimants were included in the 12 most commonly occurring state pension age combinations. All combinations that had previously been published are still included but other categories which have increased in size since the series was originally developed have been added.
Feb 2021	Used most recent version of the Customer Information System to obtain age, gender and geographical information for whole back series	The Customer Information System is continuously updated if details change on any of the administrative systems that feed into it. This means that the date of birth, gender and address history of claimants as recorded at the time of producing the newly developed Benefit Combination statistics may be different for some individuals compared to when statistics were produced previously. However, changes are minimal and differences within age, gender or geographical breakdowns are negligible.
August 2021	Issues in the source data for State Pension and Housing Benefit from February 2021 led to minor methodological changes. More details can be found in the background information note of the DWP benefits statistical summary	Nil impact – Benefit Combination figures for State Pension and Housing Benefit match those published elsewhere.
February 2022	BSP added to Benefit Combinations	Benefit Combinations statistics now contain 17 benefits and give more combinations than before, giving a more complete picture of all DWP administrative benefit claimants. Nearly 2 out of 3 BSP claimants also claim other benefits (62% in August 2021) and were included as individuals in the statistics already, though without their BSP claim identified. However, between 32,000 and 36,000 claimants in each quarter claim BSP on its own and so had not previously been captured in overall counts of benefit claimants.
February 2022	Previously, PC cases were cleaned off the caseloads of UC, JSA, IS, ESA, IB and SDA. This cleaning rule is no longer being applied, and all cases that overlap with PC claims are included in the caseloads of these six benefits. This applies to the whole Benefit Combinations back series.	Under the previous cleaning rules, for August 2021 16,000 cases would have been cleaned off the caseloads of UC, JSA, IS ESA, IB or SDA. The caseloads now match the published caseloads for UC and JSA (although 2,800 UC cases continue to be cleaned off the caseloads of IS, IB and SDA).
February 2022	Most common combinations re-evaluated and updated for Working Age Benefits	As with the similar change in February 2021, this updates the categories that are published to reflect BSP now being included and to re-order those categories in order of current size.
February 2022	The data were split on Stat-Xplore, with quarters from February 2013 to November 2018 included in one series, and the quarters since February 2019 onwards included in the second series	This has no impact on the data but makes it quicker for users to build tables in Stat-Xplore.
February 2022	Used most recent version of the Customer Information System to obtain age, gender and geographical information for whole back series	The Customer Information System is continuously updated if details change on any of the administrative systems that feed into it. This means that the date of birth, gender and address history of claimants as recorded at the time of producing the newly developed Benefit Combination statistics may be different for some individuals compared to when statistics were produced previously. However, changes are minimal and differences within age, gender or geographical breakdowns are negligible.
February 2023	The data were split on Stat-Xplore, with quarters from February 2013 to May 2021 included in one series, and the quarters since August 2021 onwards in two separate series, one for people residing in England & Wales (plus abroad and unknown cases), and the other for people residing in Scotland.	This will allow the fields for Benefit Combinations (Working Age or State Pension Age) to be adjusted in future to reflect the changing picture of common benefit combinations in Scotland whilst leaving England and Wales unaffected. Users who require a Great Britain figure for time points from August 2021 onwards can add together the England & Wales and Scotland series but must understand that the Scottish series does not include benefits administered by Scotland (Child Disability Payment and Adult Disability Payment), though it does include residual PIP and DLA claims which have not yet transferred to the new Scottish benefits.
May 2023	Geographic breakdown at ward level added to Benefit Combinations statistics on Stat-Xplore	Benefit Combinations statistics can now be viewed at ward level.
February 2024	UC Health data added to Benefit Combinations	New data feed included to give information on UC Claimants who are also on the UC Health pathway, from May 2019.
February 2024	UC Conditionality data added to Benefit Combinations	Previously, UC Conditionality was grouped into four categories. From May 2019, the Statistics now also show the six individual conditionalities for data.
February 2024	ESA Payment Type and Phase data added to Benefit Combinations	Additional level of data added to show ESA Payment Type and ESA Phase of Claim indicators for claimants of ESA, from May 2019.
February 2024	PIP/DLA/AA Daily Living award data and PIP/DLA/AA Mobility award data added to Benefit Combinations	Additional level of data added to show Daily Living award and Mobility award indicators for claimants of PIP/DLA/AA, from May 2019.
February 2024	Change of point in time at which data series are split in Stat-Xplore	This geographical split has been maintained, with one dataset prior to the split for GB figures, and two datasets after the split, one for England & Wales, and one for Scotland, however the time point for the split has shifted, in line with new developments. There is now one dataset for GB up to February 2019, and then two datasets from May 2019 onwards (one for England & Wales, and one for Scotland).
February 2024	Update to use latest NSPL file	Update to use ONS May 2023 NSPL (National Statistics Postcode Lookup) dataset, in line with DWP Statistical Publications.
February 2024	Used most recent version of the Customer Information System to obtain age, gender and geographical information for whole back series	The Customer Information System is continuously updated if details change on any of the administrative systems that feed into it. This means that the date of birth, gender and address history of claimants as recorded at the time of producing the newly developed Benefit Combination statistics may be different for some individuals compared to when statistics were produced previously. However, changes are minimal and differences within age, gender or geographical breakdowns are negligible.
February 2024	Pension Credit overlaps with other Out of Work benefits included in Out of Work groupings from May 2019	Previously there was a small undercount in Out of Work benefit claimant totals – 0.1% for data as at February 2019, having steadily reduced from 1.7% in February 2013. For the period May 2019 onwards, all Out of Work benefit combinations are available.

Question 9

9.  Feedback

Accepted Answer

We welcome feedback. If you would like to offer feedback or require further information, please contact cm.analysis.research@dwp.gov.uk

Question 10

10.  Useful links

Accepted Answer

For official statistics on each individual benefit, including detailed commentary on individual benefits, please see the DWP Benefits Statistics collection.

Build your own data tables using Stat-Xplore.

Question 11

Annex A: List and classification of variables

Accepted Answer

Geography: Local Authority (for England and Wales)

By Country: 2
By Region: 10
By Local Authority: 331

Geography: Local Authority and Ward (for England and Wales)

By Country: 2
By Region: 10
By Local Authority: 331
By Ward: 7,860

Geography: Westminster Parliamentary Constituency (for England and Wales)

By Country: 2
By Region: 10
By Westminster Parliamentary Constituency: 573

Geography: Local Authority (for Scotland)

By Country: 1
By Region: 1
By Local Authority: 32

Geography: Local Authority and Ward (for Scotland)

By Country: 1
By Region: 1
By Local Authority: 32
By Ward: 354

Geography: Scottish Parliamentary Constituency (for Scotland)

By Scottish Parliamentary Region: 8
By Scottish Parliamentary Constituency: 73

Geography: Westminster Parliamentary Constituency (for Scotland)

By Country: 1
By Region: 1
By Westminster Parliamentary Constituency: 59

Age: Single year (80 categories)

Gender (3 categories)

Male
Female
Unknown

Number of Benefits (6 categories)

1: One benefit claimed
2: Two benefits claimed
3: Three benefits claimed
4: Four benefits claimed
5: Five benefits claimed
6 or more: Six or more benefits claimed

Working/Pension Age group (3 categories)

Working Age
State Pension Age
Under 16

Benefit Combination: State Pension Age individuals only (33 categories)

SP only
SP & PIP/DLA/AA
SP & PC & HB & PIP/DLA/AA
SP & PC & HB
SP & PC & PIP/DLA/AA
SP & PC
SP & HB
SP & HB & PIP/DLA/AA
SP & CA
SP & IIDB
SP & PIP/DLA/AA & IIDB
SP & PC & PIP/DLA/AA & CA
SP & PIP/DLA/AA & CA
PC & HB
SP & PC & CA
SP & PC & HB & CA
PC & HB & PIP/DLA/AA
PC & PIP/DLA/AA
SP & HB & CA
PIP/DLA/AA only
HB only
PC & HB & CA
HB & PIP/DLA/AA
CA only
PC & CA
PC & PIP/DLA/AA & CA
HB & CA
IIDB only
PIP/DLA/AA & CA
PIP/DLA/AA & IIDB
Other

Benefit Combination: Working Age individuals only (42 categories)

UC Out-of-work only
UC Working only
HB & PIP/DLA & INCAP
UC No Work Requirements only
PIP/DLA only
PIP/DLA & INCAP
HB only
CA only
UC No Work Requirements & PIP/DLA
INCAP only
UC No Work Requirements & CA
HB & INCAP
UC Out-of-work & PIP/DLA
HB & CA & IS
JSA only
HB & CA
HB & UC Out-of-work
BSP/WB/BB only
HB & PIP/DLA
IIDB only
HB & JSA
HB & IS
UC Working & PIP/DLA
UC No Work Requirements & PIP/DLA & INCAP
CA & IS
UC Out-of-work & CA
UC No Work Requirements & PIP/DLA & CA
HB & UC No Work Requirements
PIP/DLA & CA
HB & PC
UC No Work Requirements & INCAP
UC No Work Requirements & HB & PIP/DLA
HB & UC Working
PC only
UC Out-of-work & INCAP
PIP/DLA & IIDB & INCAP
PIP/DLA & IIDB
UC Out-of-work & BSP/WB/BB
IS only
IIDB & INCAP
other

BSP, WB & BB

BSP/WB/BB
Not on BSP/WB/BB

CA

CA
Not on CA

ESA

ESA
Not on ESA

HB

HB
Not on HB

IIDB

IIDB
Not on IIDB

INCAP

INCAP
Not on INCAP

IS

IS
Not on IS

JSA

JSA
Not on JSA

PC

PC
Not on PC

PIP

PIP
Not on PIP

PIP/DLA/AA

PIP/DLA/AA
Not on PIP/DLA/AA

SP

SP
Not on SP

UC

UC
Not on UC

If an individual claims UC, they will claim one of the four UC categories

UC_NWR
UC_OOW
UC_WRK
UC_UNK

Additional Claim Details: ESA Payment Type (6 categories)

Contributions based
Both income and contributions based
Income based
No payments – credits only
Unknown/missing
Not on ESA

Additional Claim Details: ESA Phase of Claim (5 categories)

Assessment phase
Support group
Work-related activity group
Unknown/missing
Not on ESA

Additional Claim Details: UC Conditionality Regime (9 categories)

Searching for work
Working – with requirements
No work requirements
Working – no requirements
Planning for work
Preparing for work
Not available prior to April 2015
Unknown or missing regime
Not on UC

Additional Claim Details: UC Health Journey (6 categories)

Live fit note (pre-WCA)
Limited capability for work
Limited capability for work and work-related activities
Not on UC health journey
Unknown/missing
Not on UC

Additional Claim Details: PIP/DLA/AA Daily Living Award (6 categories)

Enhanced
Standard
DLA lowest
Nil
Unknown/missing
Not on PIP/DLA/AA

Additional Claim Details: PIP/DLA/AA Mobility Award (5 categories)

Enhanced
Standard
Nil
Unknown/missing
Not on PIP/DLA/AA

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