For many, BPS payment delays continue to cause stress and unwanted financial pressures at this challenging time for farming. The NFU BPS team continues to support members with a multitude of issues at this time of the year. Be assured that our work does not stop for the summer.
NFU action
We continue to take every opportunity to raise the non-payment of BPS claims with the RPA, be that at our regular face-to-face meetings with the RPA and Defra officials, or when our national officeholder team met recently with RPA CEO Paul Caldwell. The subject of BPS payments - past, present and future - was also covered at the recent Agricultural Drought Summit in London, organised by the NFU. Put simply, we need those with outstanding sums to be paid promptly and for BPS 2018 payments to be issued accurately, and in full, as soon as possible.
Too many loose ends
We continue to deal with issues that touch on every BPS payment year to date, that is 2015 through to 2017 (including the final top up payments to BPS 2017 bridging payments). It is extremely frustrating to me, as it is to the members we speak to and assist, that we are still dealing with these years.
We are seeing success with some long standing cases but there are still more to be resolved. We have raised with the RPA the need to update those waiting for pre-2017 monies, like they have done recently for those waiting for a top up to their bridging payments.
Recently the RPA has started to review payment challenges made post ‘full’ BPS 2017 payments being received - this is a lot earlier than for previous years issues, which is encouraging to see. If you believe you have not been paid correctly for BPS 2017, we urge you to check the claim made and the Claim Statement paperwork before completing an RPA Payment Query Form, which can be found here. What we all want is any pre-2018 payment work sorted out before the BPS 2018 payments start to land.
As a reminder, in terms of the output from the Payment Query Form review process, the RPA at the very least will explain their decision. There would be a remittance advice slip/revised claim statement issued where monies are released, or a debt recovery letter if there was an overpayment sticking. We continue to challenge many of the overpayment challenges seen. Seemingly many are based on a wrong starting point for the claim made by the farmer – they do not match the claim made. This is very frustrating for all concerned.
The RPA has tried to improve communicates over recent months, but it does not substitute for hard cash in cash flows or a meaningful human-to-human conversation over the phone. We continue to push for both these elements.
And then there is commoners payments...
As we covered recently in our briefing note on our commons work, we continue to push to get all adjustments to commoners payments resolved. At this time we wait to hear the RPA’s plans to issue the retrospective adjustments following the Minchinhampton and Rodborough legal challenge, which affects a large proportion of commoners.
What is coming up?
Looking ahead and just around the corner, September is a critical month for BPS payments, as it is the month that the reference exchange rate is set for BPS 2018 payments. Last year the average rate for BPS 2017 was £:€ 0.89470. We will know at the end of September where the figure will be for this year.
Also in September the RPA will distribute to the majority of 2017 BPS claimants a refund of the Financial Discipline monies deducted from BPS 2016 payments. This repayment will not match exactly what was removed, so watch out for the remittance advice slip dropping through the door and credit in the bank account. We hope the RPA will explain this payment more thoroughly this year. Be assured the NFU will explain it, so watch this space in September.
And finally...
It is great to report that, after raising with Defra earlier this year our views that the current split of CAP monies between Pillar 1 (BPS) and Pillar 2 (rural development and agri-environmental schemes) should be maintained going forward, Ministers have agreed with us that the same split should be retained, which was first agreed back in 2014. In hard cash terms, based on 2017 BPS payment rates this NFU lobbying win means a retention within your BPS payment of, on average, over £621.