MID Devon District Council is having to hire two extra staff to help it resolve the fallout from an error that led to around 1,200 social housing tenants being overcharged rent.

The local authority is trying to hire two rent correction team administrators in a bid to rectify the problem.

The roles, which are in addition to existing staff, are for 37 hours a week for a period of 12 months, and offer salaries ranging from £25,584 to £27,269 per year, depending on experience. The successful applicants will also be able to work at home for two days per week as part of the council’s hybrid working allowances.

It was an error that occurred more than two decades ago that led to incorrect rent being erroneously charged to virtually all the council’s tenants.

Roughly 1,600 tenants were also undercharged due to the mistake, which was identified last year by the council’s new auditor. However, the council is not asking those tenants to make good the shortfall.

It is, however, working out how much to refund tenants who have paid too much rent.

In April, the Regulator for Social Housing said the council had probably lost around £8 million in terms of rent it should have been charging but wasn’t, and the total it had overcharged by was an estimated £7.5 million.

Legal advice the council says it has received from the King’s Counsel suggests it only needs to pay back a maximum of six years of overpaid rent to tenants, meaning it may not pay back the full amount owed to all tenants.

Initial estimates by the council suggest it may pay back around £1.5 million to £1.8 million.

Earlier this year, it had been considering whether to pay residents compensation as well, and the details of that have now been confirmed.

“While there is no legal requirement to pay compensation, in February 2025, the council decided it was the right thing to do for our tenants,” a spokesperson for Mid Devon District Council said.

“Compensation is available to tenants who have overpaid rent and who have a rent overpayment balance above £101, once any adjustments have been made taking into account any housing benefit or Universal Credit.

“Compensation is worked out using the total overpayment, not individual years, and is based on Mid Devon Housing’s compensation policy.”

The council said it had started contacting tenants by letter when their refund had been calculated. The letter will include instructions on providing bank details and timescales regarding the refund process.

It stressed it would not cold call tenants to ask for bank details over the phone, and would never ask for a tenant to make a payment of any amount to receive a refund.

The process of calculating refunds has proved complex because of whether each tenant has had part of their rent paid via benefits.

As such, the first tenants to receive refunds, and compensation if they qualify, are likely to be those who have paid their rent without any benefit support towards it.

It said it was in the final stages of working out refunds for those on housing benefit, but it was still in contact with the Department for Work and Pensions about how to calculate refunds to tenants on Universal Credit.

For tenants who have underpaid rent, their rent will only be moved to the current level if they move to another council-owned property but annual increases could still occur.