A regional social court in Lower Saxony and Bremen has ruled that job centres are justified in reclaiming overpaid heating allowances. The court in Celle announced the decision on Tuesday.
The case involved a woman from the Lüneburg district who received monthly payments of 480 euros instead of a one-time allowance, resulting in an overpayment of 3,600 euros.
The claimant had argued that, as a layperson, she was unable to identify the error and was not obligated to scrutinize the official notices. The Lüneburg Social Court initially sided with her, citing that the job centre appeared to only ever approve benefits on a provisional basis. The regional social court now disagreed, clarifying that heating allowances had also been issued provisionally.
The judges emphasized that benefit recipients have a responsibility to read official notices and understand their key details. The claimant should have recognized that the repeated payments were significantly excessive. The court determined that no grounds existed for a claim of legitimate expectation based on the erroneous approval.
