Allowance chaos does not surprise Amersfoort victim: 'The crazy management monster must be stopped'

Today, 11:22•2 minutes of reading time

Victims of the benefits affair present a petition in the House of Parliament© AnpUtrecht - The stress and sense of unease continue for those affected by the benefits scandal. They have zero confidence in proper treatment by the government. This includes Paula Bouwer from Amersfoort. Dealing with the affair has resulted in another debacle for the victims. Implementing Organization for the Recovery of Allowances (UHT) in Utrecht has become entangled in the procedures, Nieuwsuur announced yesterday. And there is more: staff turnover is enormous, there is a culture of fear and employees are extremely afraid of making mistakes. The result is that hardly any customization is offered to victims. It takes months to make small decisions in files. Paula from Amersfoort is one of the affected parents. She is not surprised. She always had to deal with new faces when it came to treatment. As a result, her case was not properly filed and had to file an objection again. “As affected parents, we communicate a lot with each other via Facebook groups and WhatsApp. Every day, we feel that we are deliberately striving not to repair our damage.” Tomorrow, Secretary of State Aukje de Vries wants to announce that parents will be helped more quickly (no later than 2025), according to a draft letter to parliament. Former UHT employees are reacting cynically to this, Nieuwsuur reported. “How then?! The benefits scandal was caused by a lack of human touch. And that is now missing again.” Paula doesn't trust it either. “It is a politically desirable answer, but a new look at employees is not the solution. Two years ago, I received recognition that I was a victim and I am still waiting for the next steps.” De Amersfoortse is 63. She recently called to see if she could not get priority, but her business would be extra complex because she is an entrepreneur. “We now want to have the damage handled ourselves with an independent personal injury specialist. The silly management monster must be stopped “The affair is about childcare allowance. Thousands of parents have been wrongly described as fraudsters by the tax authorities. They had to pay sky-high fines. Many parents fell deeply into debt. Later, it turned out that there were similar problems with recovering housing allowance, health allowance, child-related budget and income tax.128 kbps selected as playback quality 00:00 | 04:16 Interview with Paula Bouwer on Radio M Utrecht