Incapacity for work benefits under the microscope

The government pays approximately €10 billion a year in incapacity (WIA) benefits to people who are fully or partially unable to work. It was announced in June 2024 that more errors had been made in the payments since 2020. The Employee Insurance Agency (UWV) may have made excessive payments to tens of thousands of people. This can be detrimental to their livelihood security. Internal warnings about the errors have not been followed up effectively. Errors have not been corrected and too few measures have been taken to prevent reoccurrence. The Netherlands Court of Audit has agreed to a request by the Minister of Social Affairs and Employment (SZW) to audit the matter.

What are we auditing?

The audit will consist of 2 parts:

• In the first part, we will determine how many errors have been made in WIA benefit payments since 2020 and the consequences for recipients. We will investigate the causes and the shortcomings in the UWV’s assessment of incapacity for work and its calculation of benefits.
• In the second part, we will determine why warnings about incorrect benefit payments were not followed up effectively. Who knew what and when? And why weren’t measures taken? The Minister of SZW is responsible for overseeing the UWV’s correct performance of its tasks. We will therefore investigate the minister’s oversight and identify areas for improvement.

Why are we carrying out this audit?

Benefit recipients must be able to trust that they will receive their entitlements on time, not too much and not too little. If the government makes mistakes, it must learn how it can prevent more people getting into problems. We want to learn from what went wrong and thus help improve the government’s performance for the benefit of the UWV, the Minister of SZW, parliament and other parties with an interest in the government’s performance.

Do you want to take part in this audit?

The Court of Audit invites you to share any information you may have that would benefit our audit. We appreciate all contributions, knowledge and experience you may care to share with us on this topic. Simply send an email to bijdrage@rekenkamer.nl.

We read all emails carefully and treat them in confidence. However, we are not able to reply to every contribution we receive.