Care homes 'overpaid' by county council in West Sussex, new audit reveals

Tuesday, 5 November 2019 15:48

Care homes across West Sussex have been overpaid by the county council by more than £100,000, with some payments dating back to 2008, an audit has revealed. A report to the regulation, audit and accounts committee on Monday (November, 4) highlighted money spent by the council to book beds for residents at the homes, only for those beds to become unavailable. During the three-month audit, the total overpaid stood at £363,000, but around two-thirds of that has been recovered. Decisions still have to be made about when and if the remainder – more than £100,000 – can be reclaimed. The report also said one care home in Crawley could have cost the council an estimated £32,000 in the three months of the audit, for services which were ‘underutilised’. Michael Jones (Lab, Southgate & Gossops Green) asked if the £32,000 was ‘the tip of the iceberg’ when it came to money owed. Mr Jones said he believed the council was currently negotiating with the provider and asked: "Could we be talking about getting some of this underutilised money back? "Because surely [they] don’t want to be charging us for services they haven’t actually provided." Questions were asked about the controls put in place to deal more efficiently with such overpayments, should they happen again. Members were told: "Going forward, there are controls in place. "We’ve now got monthly reports to identify where these overpayments have happened." "Of that £363,000, over two-thirds of it have now been recovered and there’s a small amount – over £100,000 – that’s been referred back to the [residential care] service, for very historic payments, that will need a decision taken on those." (By Karen Dunn - Local Democracy Reporter)