Back Dating of Vouchers

5 - Back Dating of Vouchers

This instruction is to clarify the action allocation caseworkers must take with regard to back dating when an applicant’s vouchers are unavailable or an applicant claims that his vouchers have been lost or stolen. These actions should be undertaken by Allocation and do not need to be sent to Assessment.

Stolen Vouchers

Where an applicant notifies NASS that their vouchers have been stolen they should be advised that this has to be reported to the Police and that they must notify NASS in writing quoting the crime reference number, the name/number of the Police Officer who recorded the theft and the name of the Police Station where it was reported. They should be told that no action can be taken by NASS until this is received. This notification must be signed by the applicant.

The caseworker must then issue emergency vouchers from the date we receive this written notification to the date on which the next set of regular vouchers becomes available. Faxed notifications are acceptable, but must be followed by the hard copy.

We must ensure that the applicant provides evidence in the form of a police report or crime reference number and consideration should also be given to forwarding the case to the Performance Monitoring Team once the replacement vouchers have been issued.

The paper file and ASYS must be clearly minuted to reflect that the above actions have been completed.

Before taking these actions the caseworker should check the case records to establish whether the applicant has previously reported vouchers to have been lost or stolen. If they have then the case should be referred to the Group Leader via their team leader.

Lost Vouchers

As per instructions for stolen vouchers.

NASS/Sodexho/Post Office Errors

If an applicant advises that their vouchers have not arrived or are unavailable for collection the caseworker must look into the reason for this. If it is established that the applicant is without vouchers due to an error in our processes then the caseworker should replace the missing vouchers to the value that the applicant should have received.

For example, if the applicant should have received vouchers, but they were unavailable at the Post Office, the caseworker should provide emergency vouchers to the value of those they would have received had the vouchers been available until their next regular vouchers will be ready for collection.

It is imperative however that the caseworker fully investigates the reason why the applicant has been unable to collect their vouchers and the outcome must be reported to their Team Leader as well as being fully minuted on ASYS and the paper file.

Other Cases

In any other circumstances the caseworker should seek advice from their Group Leader via their Team Leader. Caseworkers must not send out or back date vouchers if they are uncertain of the value to be issued.