About us
The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) is responsible for welfare, pensions and child maintenance policy. As the UK鈥檚 biggest public service department it administers the State Pension and a range of working age, disability and ill health benefits to around 20 million claimants and customers.
DWP鈥檚 aim is to improve people鈥檚 day to day lives and help them build financial resilience and a more secure and prosperous future.
Responsibilities
We are responsible for:
- helping people to move into work and supporting those already in work to progress, with the aim of increasing overall workforce participation
- helping people to plan and save for later life, while providing a safety net for those who need it now
- providing effective, efficient, and innovative services to the millions of claimants who rely on us every day, including the most vulnerable in society
- improving experience of our services while maximising value for money for the taxpayer
Priorities
Our priorities for April 2023 to March 2025 are to:
- maximise employment, reduce economic inactivity and support the progression of those in work
- provide financial support to people who are entitled to it
- enable disabled people and people with health conditions to start, stay and succeed in work, and get financial support
- support financial resilience in later life
Read the DWP annual report and accounts 2022 to 2023 to find out more about how we are delivering against our objectives.
Who we are
We provide our services in a number of ways, for example through Jobcentre Plus, The Pension Service, the Child Maintenance Service and partner organisations.
Read about聽our service standards in our customer charter.
Carers and disability benefits
We deal with carers and disability benefits including:
- Carer鈥檚 Allowance
- Attendance Allowance
- Disability Living Allowance (DLA) for adults
- Disability Living Allowance (DLA) for children
- Personal Independence Payment (PIP)
Jobcentre Plus
Jobcentre Plus helps people move聽from benefits into work聽and helps employers聽advertise jobs. It also deals with聽benefits聽for people who are unemployed or unable to work because of a聽health condition or disability.
The Pension Service
The Pension Service provides pensions, benefits and retirement information for current and future pensioners in the UK and abroad. This includes:
Child Support Agency and Child Maintenance Service
Child maintenance is financial support that helps towards a child鈥檚 everyday living costs when the parents have separated. For people who can鈥檛 make their own family-based arrangements, the Child Support Agency and Child Maintenance Service:
- calculate how much maintenance the paying parent should pay to the receiving parent
- collect the maintenance payments, if necessary
Arm鈥檚-length bodies
Our arm鈥檚-length bodies play an important role in delivery of our services. The bodies support our objectives to deliver high quality services for taxpayers, and to deliver improved and efficient services, through regulation, guidance, consumer protection, complaints handling, research, and investigation.
Corporate information
Access our information
- Accessible documents policy
- Complaints procedure
- Equality and diversity
- Media enquiries
- Modern slavery statement
- Our energy use
- Our governance
- Research at DWP
- Statistics at DWP
Jobs and contracts
Read about the types of information we routinely publish in our Publication scheme. Find out about our commitment to Welsh language scheme. Our Personal information charter explains how we treat your personal information. Read our policy on Social media use.