Universal Credit audit: what happened after the 2013 report

What the audit found

The 2013 audit found that the Department had delayed national rollout, lacked adequate measures of progress and could not assess the value of systems on which it had spent more than £300 million. Of £425 million spent by April 2013, £303 million related to IT investment ¹.

The Department had started a limited pilot and was reconsidering its rollout plan. The NAO recorded a £34 million write-off of new IT assets and found that the early systems had limited functions ¹.

The official response

The Department told the NAO that it accepted the recommendations. Its accounting officer said the report covered the period before the programme reset and that new leadership and controls were in place ¹.

The Department's 2022 assessment continued to state that the programme had a value-for-money case. The 2024 NAO report recorded that position, but said the Department lacked evidence that the projected scale of benefits had been achieved ².

Parliament

The 2013 report was presented to the House of Commons under the National Audit Act 1983. The report records parliamentary questions and committee scrutiny as part of the programme history ¹.

Later NAO work continued to provide Parliament with evidence on claimant migration, implementation costs and fraud and error. The Comptroller and Auditor General has qualified the regularity opinion on DWP benefit expenditure in successive accounts ^3,4.

Follow-up audits and recommendations

A 2020 NAO report found that first-payment timeliness had improved, but that vulnerable claimants and people with complex claims could struggle with the process. It recorded higher forecast implementation costs and persistent fraud and error ³.

The February 2024 follow-up found that DWP had a clear plan for moving most legacy claimants. It said the programme completion date had moved by at least six years since the 2018 business case and estimated implementation costs had increased by more than £900 million, or 45 per cent ².

Courts, tribunals and investigations

No court judgment deciding the NAO's 2013 value-for-money finding was identified in the official sources reviewed as of 19 October 2026. Individual benefit decisions may follow separate review and tribunal routes, which are outside the scope of these audit reports.

Where it stands now

The programme moved beyond the limited 2013 pilot and serves millions of claimants. The 2024 audit said DWP was on track to move most legacy benefit claimants by the end of 2024, but faced harder cases later in the migration ².

The 2025 accounts audit retained a qualified regularity opinion due to material fraud and error in benefit expenditure. It reported satisfactory testing of the completeness and accuracy of benefit expenditure, a separate financial-statement question from regularity ⁴.

Timeline