Ms Niamh O'Donoghue:

Perhaps I could give the Deputy some figures. In 2013, of the overpayments raised, 34% were considered to be attributable to customer error. In 2014, it was 40%. So far this year — this is very preliminary stuff to the end of April 2015 — it is 38%.

We have significantly improved our investment in the training of deciding officers, and we have also put in place a fairly sophisticated new system of debt recovery and assessment, which means we are raising overpayments in a much more timely way. Decisions are being made much closer to an event occurring rather than at some time prospectively. That probably improves the consistency with which things are defined.