Does DWP text about Winter Fuel Payment, PIP or Universal Credit?

DWP will only ever send a link that points to the official GOV.UK website. It will never ask you to confirm personal or bank details by text, and it never charges a fee to release a benefit payment. A text asking you to click a link and enter your details to 'apply' or 'confirm eligibility' for Winter Fuel Payment, PIP, Universal Credit, Attendance Allowance or State Pension is a scam.

I clicked the link and entered my bank details, what now?

Contact your bank immediately to freeze the account and report unauthorised transactions. Forward the scam text to 7726 (free, standard network rates apply), and report the fraud to Action Fraud at actionfraud.police.uk or 0300 123 2040.

Fake DWP Text: Winter Fuel & Universal Credit Scam (2026)

What DWP actually says: DWP will only ever send a link that points to the official GOV.UK website. It will never ask you to confirm personal or bank details by text, and never charges a fee to release a benefit payment.

How the fake benefits text works

Step 1

The seasonal hook

Texts spike around Winter Fuel Payment season and cost-of-living support announcements, when a genuine payment is plausible and often front of mind for pensioners.

Step 2

The urgency

"Your claim expires" or "act now to avoid missing this payment" — designed to short-circuit a moment of doubt, especially for vulnerable or elderly recipients.

Step 3

The lookalike site

The link opens a page mimicking GOV.UK, asking for bank details or National Insurance number to "process" the payment.

Step 4

The theft

Entering details there sends them straight to the scammer — a genuine benefit is paid automatically into the account DWP already holds on file, never claimed via a text link.

How to spot it

Any link that isn't gov.uk: DWP only ever links to the official GOV.UK domain — anything else is fake.
A request for bank details or National Insurance number via text reply or a linked form.
Urgency around a deadline or "expiring" claim, especially tied to Winter Fuel Payment or cost-of-living support.

What to do if you get this text

Don't click, don't reply with any information.
Report it: forward the text to 7726 (free, standard network rates apply).
Check the real way: log into your account directly at gov.uk, typed manually, or check your official DWP correspondence by post.

Egidio: your automatic phishing detector

These texts work because they land exactly when a real payment is plausible, and they often target the people least equipped to spot a lookalike domain. Egidio catches the fake link before it can do anything.

Egidio screens incoming calls and scans links arriving through your messaging apps in real time. When it recognises a fake DWP or government site, it blocks the page before it loads.

Install Egidio