Work coaches use their knowledge of claimants to decide what support a claimant might benefit from and whether to refer people onto particular schemes. However, the Department is not able to use this information when planning the scale of support it needs to provide because it is not always recorded on the system, and when it is recorded this is as free-text notes on a person’s benefit claim rather than something that can be easily aggregated and used to predict demand.13 Work coaches would k...

Work coaches use their knowledge of claimants to decide what support a claimant might benefit from and whether to refer people onto particular schemes. However, the Department is not able to use this information when planning the scale of support it needs to provide because it is not always recorded on the system, and when it is recorded this is as free-text notes on a person’s benefit claim rather than something that can be easily aggregated and used to predict demand.13 Work coaches would know, for example, if claimants had English as a second language and so might benefit from language support as part of Restart. However, while the Departm Type: conclusion | Number: 8 | Response status: not_addressed Government response: 4.1 The government agrees with the Committee’s recommendation. Recommendation implemented 4.2 The department has introduced improvements, most recently in March 2023, within the Universal Credit system to record more information on claimant’s circumstances and pot