previously estimated. The Department for Work and Pensions explained that the delay was due to 900,000 more claimants than expected remaining on the legacy welfare schemes that Universal Credit is replacing. The delay is estimated to add more than £500 million to its overall cost. Support Support for claimants was initially delivered by local authorities. In October 2018, the Department for Work and Pensions announced that from April 2019, Citizens Advice and Citizens Advice Scotland would be provided with £39 million of funding and £12 million in set up costs to deliver Universal Support. In April 2019, this was rebranded as the "Help to Claim" service and helpline, delivered by Citizens Advice and Citizens Advice Scotland. Unemployment claimant count Before 2013, the unemployment claimant count was simply the number of people claiming Jobseeker's Allowance. However, Universal Credit implementation has gradually broadened the groups of people who are required to look for work. For example, those that had previously claimed Child Tax Credit or Housing Benefit but not Jobseeker's Allowance, such as a person looking after children full time at home with a working partner, were not required to seek work. Under Universal Credit, the partners of claimants are now generally required to seek work. Another example is Universal Credit claimants who would previously have received Employment and Support Allowance, or were awaiting a Work Capability Assessment, are now generally required to look for work. Between November 2015 and November 2019, the number of claimants increased by over 70% (420,000), largely due to such causes. In many areas the claimant count had more than doubled, and in some more than quadrupled. Consequently, in 2018 the UK Statistics Authority removed its quality mark from claimant count statistics as it no longer provided a reliable comparator against previous labour market statistics. In 2019 the DWP published an alternative claimant count series, which used modelling to estimate the number of claimants had Universal Credit been fully implemented in 2013, for use in statistical labour market comparison. Changing monthly pay day When claimants are paid salary a few days early by employers, for example because of weekends or bank holidays, this can result in two monthly payments in one assessment period and zero in the next. This results in both very uneven Universal Credit payments and lower payments over the complete year because of the cancellation of work allowance for entire months, causing hardship and