Guidance

Move to Universal Credit statistics: background information

Updated 12 November 2024

Applies to England, Scotland and Wales

The Move to Universal Credit statistics cover the number of people who have been sent managed migration notices inviting them to claim Universal Credit.

1. Background information

Universal Credit (UC) replaces six legacy benefits with a single, streamlined and simplified, digitally delivered benefit system that provides work incentives for those who can work and support for those who cannot. UC has been introduced in a controlled and phased manner with legislation preventing new claims to working age income related benefits and existing legacy benefit claims terminated if a claim to UC is made. This means all new claims are now to UC.

Households claiming income-based Jobseekers Allowance (JSA), Income Support (IS), income-based Employment Support Allowance (ESA), Housing Benefit, or tax credits (both Working Tax Credits (WTC) and Child Tax Credits (CTC)) may choose to make a claim to UC (voluntary migration). Those customers experiencing a change of circumstance that would normally have prompted a new legacy benefit claim will now need to claim UC to maintain their working age income related benefit entitlement (natural migration). The remainder of the legacy benefit population - who do not move voluntarily or through natural migration - will be informed that they must claim UC to maintain their benefit entitlement (managed migration).

The initial pilot for testing the approach to managed migration was suspended due to the pandemic in March 2020. The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) then resumed moving customers in May 2022 in selected areas. In mid-2022, DWP began to focus specifically on households that are solely in receipt of WTC and/or CTC to support plans to notify over 500,000 tax credit only households to move to UC by the end of the 2023 to 2024 financial year.

The process for managed migration involves legacy benefit customers being sent a Migration Notice with a three-month deadline, by which they must make a claim to UC to continue to receive financial support. The notice also outlines how to access support to make this UC claim.

Customers who claim within their deadline period (including any extension given), or within a month after it has passed, will be assessed for Transitional Protection (TP). TP includes Transitional Element (TE) which is provided to all eligible customers who would otherwise have a lower entitlement on UC than they had to existing benefits. TE will be calculated by comparing their final total existing benefit entitlement with their UC entitlement based on their circumstances on the last day of their legacy award. Any deficit will result in TE being paid. The payment of TE will not be time limited, but will be reduced (eroded) permanently if any other UC element, except the Childcare Element, is increased or newly awarded.

In January 2023, the department published Learning from the Discovery Phase. This outlined the approach to managed migration, and the findings from the first 499 Migration Notices issued (the ‘Earliest Testable Service’).

Further learning from Tax Credit migrations and initial Discovery activity for wider benefits cohorts. was published in February 2024. This detailed findings from research undertaken to understand why not all tax credit claimants move to UC, and early evidence on the scale of Enhanced Support requirements from 523 households receiving other combinations of legacy benefits who were invited to claim in September 2023.

From April 2024, the department began sending migration notices to households receiving Income Support benefit, and households receiving tax credits with Housing Benefit only. From June 2024, households in receipt of Housing Benefit only started receiving migration notices, and from July 2024 migration notices were extended to income related Employment Support Allowance households in receipt of Child Tax Credits.

2. About these statistics

Purpose

UC has been available to the full range of applicants in every Jobcentre across Great Britain since December 2018. A process of moving existing customers of DWP legacy benefits or tax credits to UC restarted in May 2022, when the first cohort of customers were sent a Migration Notice inviting them to make a UC claim. To date, the vast majority of households invited to move have been recipients only of tax credits. However, these statistics also include a relatively small but growing number of recipients of benefits administered by DWP.

These statistics cover those areas of Great Britain where Migration Notices have sent out.

These statistics have been developed to provide information on:

• the number of people who have been sent a Migration Notice
• of those:
  • the number who have made a UC claim
  • the number who have not yet claimed UC but whose three-month deadline has not yet passed
  • the number who have not claimed UC and whose DWP legacy benefit or tax credit has been terminated
• the number of households that have been sent a Migration Notice
• the number who have made a UC claim and have been awarded transitional protection
• the number who have made a UC claim and have been issued a statement.

This information is broken down by:

• month Migration Notice was sent
• personal characteristics (age and gender)
• geography (standard geographical region, Local Authority District and Parliamentary Constituency)
• support UC replaces (DWP legacy benefits or tax credits)
• household type (single female, single male or couple)

Please note that household data cannot be broken down by age.

Users and uses

The statistics are used by a wide variety of people and teams within DWP, other central government departments, Scottish and Welsh devolved administrations and local authorities across Great Britain.

What the data can be used for

The data can be used to monitor the progress of Move to UC and answer the following questions:

• how many people, so far, have been invited to claim UC?
• how many households, so far, have been invited to claim UC?
• of those, how many have:
  • not yet but may soon make a claim to UC?
  • been issued at least one reminder to claim UC?
  • made a claim to UC?
  • have not claimed UC?
  • had transitional protection applied to initial calculation of their Universal Credit award?
  • had a statement confirmed as part of their UC claim?

What the data cannot be used for

The data describe the status and outcomes of recipients of issued Migration Notices. Recipients were selected based on their household or previous legacy benefit or tax credit type. This means that customers who have been sent a Migration Notice to date will not be representative of the complete population who will be sent a Migration Notice.

Therefore, these data cannot be generalised to the population of households still claiming legacy benefits who will be invited to move to UC. In particular, the data cannot answer the following questions for all households who will be invited to move to UC:

• how many people will receive a smaller award on UC than their previous DWP legacy benefit or tax credit?
• do personal characteristics or geographical location influence whether people make a claim to UC following a Migration Notice?

3. Source data and methodology

The data used in this publication are based on extracts of the administrative system used to identify customers of legacy benefits and send a Migration Notice inviting them to claim UC. Data on customers of legacy benefits who have been sent a Migration Notice were extracted from live systems approximately one month before date of publication. The date customers are sent a Migration Notice is stored in the data extract and is used to summarise the number of customers invited to join UC over time.

The data used for these statistics come from a snapshot taken on the extract date. Consequently, these statistics only represent the circumstances that customers are in at that point in time. For example, it may be that a customer is yet to make a claim to UC on the date the snapshot is taken, but two days later may make a claim. Specifically, an individual may be accurately recorded as having not claimed UC within the three month claim deadline and had their legacy benefit closed at the time of the data extract. However, if the individual subsequently claimed UC within a month of their deadline date, the classification would change in the subsequent release as claiming UC. For this reason, the statistics in the latest release supersedes any previous releases.

The Move to UC administrative system only contains information necessary for administering the Move process, including status of Migration Notice, previous legacy benefit in receipt of, transitional protection, and date Migration Notice was sent. Additional information is matched on from the Customer Information System (CIS). Information about the UC claim is matched on from the UC Full Service administrative system which contains information necessary for administering Universal Credit.

CIS holds basic identifying information about all our customers, including their gender, noted as male or female, and date of birth. In these statistics the term gender is used to denote sex at birth, or after a Gender Recognition Certificate has been issued (see page 12 of the CIS document). Age reported in these statistics is calculated at the date which the migration notice is sent by combining date of birth from CIS with the date the migration notice was sent from the administrative system.

Postcodes are taken from the CIS data and combined with geographical details obtained from the Office for National Statistics National Statistics Postcode Look-up (NSPL). This process aggregates postcodes into Government Office Regions. England, Scotland and Wales data represent geographical boundaries derived from Census 2011 data.

4. Quality

Quality in statistics is a measure of their ‘fitness for purpose’. The European Statistics System (ESS) Dimensions of Quality provides a framework in which statisticians can assess the quality of their statistical outputs. These dimensions of quality are: relevance, accuracy and reliability, timeliness, accessibility and clarity, and comparability and coherence.

5. Status and administrative procedures for these statistics

These are ‘official statistics in development’.

Official statistics in development are official statistics that are undergoing development; they may be new or existing statistics, and will be tested with users, in line with the standards of trustworthiness, quality, and value in the Code of Practice for Statistics.

Compliance with the Code of Practice for Statistics

These statistics have been developed to follow the Code of Practice for Statistics.

We have worked to the following principles in developing the new series so as to:

• be of appropriate quality
• give a rounded and impartial view, be produced impartially, and free from political influence
• include sufficient background and methodology information
• be presented in a politically neutral manner
• be useful, easy to access, remain relevant and support understanding of important issues

Disclosure Control

The Code of Practice for Statistics (CoP) and specifically T6 Data governance, and Government Statistical Service (GSS) Guidance on Anonymisation and data confidentiality set out the principles for how we protect data on individuals from being disclosed.

Introduced Random Error

Introduced random error is used with Stat-Xplore to ensure that no data are released which could risk the identification of individuals in the statistics.

Many classifications used within Stat-Xplore 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 / household 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 Stat-Xplore 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.

Data confidentiality

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

Pre-release access

The Code of Practice for Statistics, principle T3 Orderly release specifically references pre-release guidance in sections T3.3 & T3.4.

We’ve published a a list of officials who have received pre-release access to Move to Universal Credit Official Statistics up to 24 hours in advance of publication.

Frequency

Move to Universal Credit statistics are released on a quarterly basis. Quarterly data is published via Stat-Xplore in February, May, August, and November alongside a statistical bulletin providing commentary on the latest statistics. The exact dates for the quarterly releases will be listed in the statistics release calendar.

6. Glossary

Migration Notice

A letter sent to customers inviting them to make a claim to UC and informing them of their deadline to claim before their legacy benefits become terminated.

A household is included in the number of Migration Notices sent at the point that a Migration Notice is mailed by DWP to a household identified as within scope of the managed migration process.

A small number of households may be subsequently identified as not being eligible for managed migration – these households will be removed from the count of Migration Notices sent at this point. Therefore, counts of Migration Notices sent are subject to revision.

Migration Notices sent are counted at an individual level unless otherwise stated in tables reporting at household level.

Legacy Benefit

These are benefits that are being replaced by Universal Credit, including:

• income-based JSA
• income-related ESA
• IS
• HB
• CTC
• WTC

Single Adult Household

Where the Migration Notice is sent to a household consisting of a single, eligible tax credits/DWP benefits claimant.

Couple Household

Where two Migration Notices are sent to a household consisting of at least one customer. Note that a small number of individuals will be sent a Migration Notice where they themselves are not a customer, but their partner is claiming a legacy benefit. Further, some eligible tax credit couple customers may not be eligible for UC as a couple.

UC Claim

When a claim is made to UC after the customer has been sent a Migration Notice, before the legacy benefits are terminated a number of verification checks are made on the administrative system to ensure that termination of benefits is actioned only once it is robustly associated with a UC claim. These statistics count claims once they have been through the verification process. Therefore, the number of claims in this release may change in future publications as claims pending the verification process are not yet captured.

Claims will also only be counted:

• if the claim date recorded is not before the date the migration notice was sent, or additional data within the Move to UC system indicates that the claim is as a result of the managed migration process
• if the claim is made within one month of the migration deadline or any extensions granted

Claims are counted at an individual level unless otherwise stated in tables reporting at household level.

Transitional Protection

Transitional protection only applies to those who make a ‘qualifying claim’ for universal credit. A qualifying claim is a claim for UC by a single customer who has been issued with a migration notice or by joint customers who have both been issued with a migration notice. The claim must be made on or before the final deadline.

The final deadline is the day that would be the last day of the first assessment period in relation to an award commencing on the deadline day. Deadline day is the day specified in the migration notice by which a UC claim must be made. If a UC claim is not made by that date, legacy benefits will terminate. This rule allows someone who misses their deadline date, who has their legacy benefits terminated, to make a UC claim within a month of the deadline day and retain entitlement to transitional protection.

Transitional protection is made up of a transitional capital disregard and a transitional element.

Eligibility for TP, and the amount awarded, may change over the course of the UC claim if customers’ circumstances change. Read further details about Transitional Protection.

UC is a household benefit, as such an award of transitional protection is made to a household.

Received Statement

When a household claims UC, they must provide information about their circumstances (declaration) before their first assessment period begins. The first assessment period is one calendar month from their declaration. Within the first assessment period the new customer(s) must have their evidence of ID verified and they must accept the claimant commitment associated with their UC conditionality regime. Once these actions are taken, a statement is issued for the first assessment period and confirms that the claim is eligible for UC payment to be made.

These statistics count how many households sent a migration notice and who make a UC claim receive a statement as confirmation of eligibility. However, there may be instances where households are not yet receiving a UC payment or their UC payment is zero.

7. Feedback

We welcome feedback.

We are committed to improving the official statistics we publish. We want to encourage and promote user engagement, so we can improve our statistical outputs. We would welcome any views you have using the contact information below:

For media enquiries please contact the DWP press office.

Statistical contacts

M Payne, A Buckner, B Maw: ucad.briefinganalysis@dwp.gov.uk

8. Useful links

Collection of Move to Universal Credit statistics

Further information about Universal Credit, including making a claim

Further information about Child Tax Credit, including making a claim.

ISBN: 978-1-78659-537-9