The Benefits Administration club has been running since the launch of the Benchmarking Clubs, providing cost and performance comparisons for the Benefits Administration service. The last couple of years have seen a significant rise in membership, with more authorities interested in comparing their performance.

The main cost benchmark is the cost per weighted caseload, weighted in line with the old DWP subsidy formula. As well as the aggregated costs, we look at costs by activity, where we divide the total cost into activities such as customer reception, processing etc.

In addition, the report contains a large number of other measures covering:

• Performance
• Workload
• Overpayments and Fraud
• Interventions
• Staffing and Employment
• Contact/call centre structure.