How and when housing benefit is paid

Housing benefit payments are ordinarily paid to you or your landlord every four weeks.

If your housing benefit is paid on a four-weekly basis the payment will go into your bank account on the following dates:

Council tenants: the payment will be paid directly to your rent account.
Private and housing association tenants: payments will be paid into your bank account in arrears. This will happen either weekly, every two weeks, or every four weeks. If you are paid every four weeks you will receive 13 payments a year. If the first payment of your Housing Benefit covers a period of eight weeks or more, your Housing Benefit will be paid to your landlord. If you do not want this payment to go to your landlord, please explain why. You'll need to provide proof that your rent is paid up to date. For some circumstances we can make arrangements to pay your landlord directly. The payments will be made every four weeks in arrears only.