Carer's Allowance Application Numbers

Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 23 October 2012

Tuesday, 23 October 2012

Questions (342, 343, 344)

Pearse Doherty

Question:

342. Deputy Pearse Doherty asked the Minister for Social Protection the number of carer's allowance applications processed by her Department per month over the past six months; the number of applications received, granted and refused; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [46040/12]

Pearse Doherty

Question:

343. Deputy Pearse Doherty asked the Minister for Social Protection her views on the fact that her Department are currently processing carer's allowance applications submitted in November 2011; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [46041/12]

Pearse Doherty

Question:

344. Deputy Pearse Doherty asked the Minister for Social Protection the number of carer's allowance applications received in her Department for the six months preceding November 2011; and the number of applications received, granted and refused. [46042/12]

Written answers

Minister for Social Protection (Deputy Joan Burton)

I propose to take Questions Nos. 342 to 344, inclusive, together.

Please find the information requested is the tables below. The first table outlines the number of carer’s allowance applications registered, decided, awarded, disallowed and refused for the past six months. The second table shows the same information for the six months preceding November 2011.

Month 2012	Applications Registered	Applications Decided	Applications Awarded	Applications Disallowed	Applications Withdrawn
May	1869	1252	666	440	146
June	740	1318	646	536	136
July	2302	1676	764	771	141
August	2112	1600	792	651	157
September	1147	1317	724	480	113
October*	672*	1804*	900*	727*	177*

*Up to week ending 21/10/12

Month 2011	Applications Registered	Applications Decided	Applications Awarded	Applications Disallowed	Applications Withdrawn
May	1374	1021	589	306	126
June	1074	698	411	234	53
July	1482	1618	900	568	150
August	793	982	564	368	50
September	2710	1195	631	481	83
October	2232	1185	634	440	111

I acknowledge that the time taken to process carer’s allowance claims at present is not satisfactory but I am satisfied that the Department is taking appropriate action to resolve the situation.

Carer’s allowance section has recently completed a major service delivery modernisation project to improve the efficiency with which it processes applications from clients for carer’s allowance. The project involved the development of IT functionality and associated business process re-organisation. Full deployment of the new system for Carer’s Allowance was completed in June 2012.

Following the completion of the modernisation project, an in-depth business process improvement (BPI) project was completed for the carer’s allowance scheme. This project focused on optimising output and customer service and the reduction of backlogs. The outcome of the review is the division of work into two streams. One concentrates on dealing with new claim intake and processes these without delay and the other on the backlog which is ring-fenced with a clear and targeted plan for its elimination. Implementation of the plan commenced on Monday 3 September and will be closely monitored and managed to ensure it achieves its objectives. A noted increase in the number of new claims processed was achieved in September, where claims processed substantially exceeded claim intake, and this increase continues into October. However, it will take a number of months before the backlog is reduced to an acceptable level. The allocation of available resources to this task continues to be monitored.