IT TAKES nearly three weeks longer to process a new housing benefit claim in Southampton than it does in the rest of the country, the Daily Echo can reveal today.

That is the figure which has left many city tenants close to being made homeless and landlords behind on their mortgages.

According to government figures released for 2001/2002, Southampton residents can expect to wait for up to 70 days before a decision is made on their housing benefit application. That is twice as long as the government's own 36-day target and almost three weeks longer than a national average of 51 days and a Hampshire average of 52 days.

But the Housing Benefit Regulations 1987 stipulates that a decision has to be made within 14 days of an application for housing benefit and payment should be made a further 14 days after notification of the decision.

Now one of the country's leading housing and homeless charities Shelter has called on the city council to get its act together.

"It would be constructive for Southampton council to looks at ways of improving its housing benefit system," a Shelter spokeswoman said.

"It is unacceptable that people could lose their homes because of delays in the payments of benefits that are supposed to help them keep a roof over their head.

"Shelter sees thousands of families and individuals every year who have been evicted from their properties and made homeless because of delays in the payment of housing benefit."

As revealed in the Daily Echo, Southampton's housing benefits office had to close for two weeks in order to help catch up with a 16-week backlog. One Southampton resident affected by the delay is father-of-one Joshua Clark, 29, from Howard Road, Shirley.

The self-employed publisher has less than two weeks to pay his landlord £1,556 in rent accumulated since January and has had to live off child benefit.

Mr Clark said: "In January I went into renew my housing benefit and they said they needed proof of my child benefit and would send me a letter, which I never received. Four weeks later they cancelled my housing benefit.

"They tried to persuade me not to make an appeal as that would take six weeks but to make a fresh application, which would be back dated. That was seven weeks ago and I heard nothing back so I went to the office and they then told me I had to fill out a self-employment form. Why couldn't they tell me that earlier?

"All we have had is £60 to live on this month and that is supposed to be going on my daughter."

Winchester landlord Malcolm Clark of the Southern Private Landlords Association believes the situation would be eased if the council fulfilled "their legal obligation and started interim payments at 14 days from the tenants application".

He said that the tenant should contact a solicitor and seek a judicial review, which would be paid for from the Community Fund.

A spokeswoman for the city council said they were taking steps to rectifying the situation.

"We are working towards the 36-day aspirational target the government has set for all authorities for the year 2006/07," she said.

"As soon as we recover from implementing the Verification Framework, our turn around times will improve. Other authorities that use the framework have experienced a similar dip in performance. The main problem with the Verification Framework is that about 95 per cent of all cases submitted are incomplete and therefore payment on account not applicable."