Welfare Payment Reduced: An Improved Method for Detecting Erroneous Welfare Payments

The Department of Health, Education, and Welfare (HEW) requires that all Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) welfare cases be reviewed every 6 months to determine continued eligibility and correctness of payments. According to the District of Columbia (D.C.), limited staff allowed only 20 percent on its AFDC cases to be reviewed. It needed an effective method to identify potential error cases to permit more efficient use of manpower, to increase the number of error cases reviewed, and to materially reduce errors and incorrect payments.