COUNCIL chiefs have apologised after they left hundreds of the North-East’s poorest people out of pocket without warning.

Durham County Council changed the day it pays housing benefits to people in Weardale and Teesdale whose surnames start with the letters A to K.

People who receive the fortnightly benefit were only made aware of the change when they were given a single week’s benefit a week early.

However, after scheduling the claimants’ next payments for a fortnight later, the council had left people short by one week’s rent. One man, whose elderly parents have been affected, said: “People who receive housing benefit tend not to have spare cash lying round.

“What the council is doing is asking people to ask their landlords for a payment holiday or to accept the rent a week late forever more.

“It might have been a bit easier if they had been given some notice of the changes “If they cannot work something out with their landlords, then they are going to have to make up the difference themselves somehow.

“What makes this worse is when the council decided to change the date its staff would be paid their wages, they gave them six months’ notice. They obviously know that when it comes to paying the bills, it is not always as simple as just changing the payment date.”

Don McLure, the county council’s corporate director of resources, said the council had made an error of judgement.

He added: “We are currently in the process of moving from seven separate benefit systems into one new countywide system that will enable us to provide a better service for our customers.

“As a result of the latest phase of this work, we have had to bring forward some payment dates for some of our customers.

“We appreciate that this may have caused some confusion and, unfortunately, we failed to inform people that these changes were due to happen. We would like to assure our customers that they have received their correct payments and apologise to anyone who has been inconvenienced by our mistake.”