Jeff Smith – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jeff Smith on 2016-05-23.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, how many fines have been issued for claiming free prescriptions without a valid exemption certificate in each (a) month and (b) year since the NHS Business Services Authority began checking eligibility for free prescriptions in September 2014.

Alistair Burt

Since September 2014, when the NHS Business Services Authority (NHSBSA) took on responsibility for the service, a total of 747,790 penalty charge notices have been issued where someone claimed exemption on the basis that they held a valid exemption certificate but this could not be verified by the NHSBSA. A further 278,053 surcharge letters have been issued to follow up on penalty charge notices which have not been resolved through payment, cancellation (due to correction of erroneous information, for example) or waiving of the penalty charge. The annual and monthly breakdown is set out below.

Annual breakdown of Penalty Charges Notices and Surcharge letters

Monthly breakdown of Penalty Charge Notices and Surcharge letters