Tooting and Wandsworth benefit cheats to repay £15,000 (From Surrey Comet)

Tooting and Wandsworth benefit cheats to repay £15,000

9:26am Friday 21st November 2008

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Two housing benefit cheats will have to pay back more than £15,000 in fraudulent claims and carry out over 300 hours of community service after they were taken to court by the council.

Javed Akter Kayani, of Gatton Road, Tooting, pleaded guilty to one charge of deception at South Western Magistrates’ Court after it was discovered he had failed to declare all the money he and his wife held in their bank accounts and had fraudulently claimed £20,327.

He was sentenced to 240 hours unpaid community service and ordered to pay legal costs of £506.

He has already paid back £10,000 of the benefit money and has made arrangements to pay off the remainder.

The second benefit cheat, David Hoyte, of Sudbury House, Wandsworth, admitted one offence of deception after he failed to inform benefits officials that he had another adult living in his house for several years, and had claimed £5,284 he was not entitled to.

He was sentenced to 100 hours unpaid community service and ordered to pay £100 in court costs. He will now have to pay back the entire sum he fraudulently claimed.

Anyone with information about benefit cheats can call the investigation team in confidence on the council's free fraud hotline on 0800 328 6340 or call the council's benefit investigation service on 020 8871 7067

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