Tell us about any changes in your situation

Even small changes can affect how much benefit you can get.

Legal action may be taken against you if you purposely give us false information or don’t tell us of a change in your situation, getting more benefit than you are entitled to.

Please do not rely on someone else, like:

• Your landlord
• The Job Centre
• HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC)
• Your friend
• Other people living with you

Tell us yourself as soon as possible.

The following are some of the changes you must tell us about.

Use the online change of circumstances form if:

• there is a change in your income or benefits, or in the income or benefits of anyone living with you
• anyone moves in or out of your home
• anyone comes to stay with you (even for a short time)
• your hours change, or you change jobs
• you start or stop working
• your wealth or savings increase above £6,000
• you or anyone living with you will be away from home for more than 4 weeks
• you go into or come out of hospital
• you're moving out of Waltham Forest
• you're moving in the borough and want to claim at your new address

Use the full benefit claim form if you move:

• into Waltham Forest from another borough

These are only examples of some of the changes you need to tell us about.  If you aren’t sure if a change might affect your benefit, then tell us on the form anyway or contact us for more information.

We may ask you to provide evidence to support your claim.

Benefit on two homes

You can ask us to pay your Housing Benefit on 2 addresses at the same time for up to 4 weeks. We can pay you this ‘overlapping benefit’ if you’ve moved into your new home and we accept that you couldn’t have reasonably avoided paying two rents at the same time.

You can tell us about the change by:

• using the online change of circumstance form

• calling us on 020 8496 3000 between 9am to 5pm, Monday to Friday

• visiting a Library Plus branch with free internet access to complete an online form and drop off evidence:

  • North Chingford Library, The Green, Chingford, E4 7EN

  • Walthamstow Library, High Street, Walthamstow, E17 7JN

  • Leyton Library, High Road Leyton, E10 5QH

You can only drop off evidence and report a change at the libraries on Monday to Friday from 9am to 5pm, regardless of the library's opening hours.

Please make a note of the 10-character form reference in case you need to ask us something. You can also use this reference to go back and complete the form later.

Once you have answered the questions on all of the pages, click ‘show errors’ to confirm that the form is complete. Any pages with errors will be shown. Click on the page number to go to that page where the issue will be highlighted.

You can attach any evidence required by clicking ‘upload & attach file’.

If you get stuck, and cannot submit the form, please use the ‘contact us’ option to send us a message. If you send us the form reference we will be able to help you more quickly.

Once any errors have been resolved you can securely submit the form by clicking ‘Submit’.

When we have received your form, you will see a confirmation message on your screen. We will send you an email to confirm that we have received your application.