AN improvement in the time taken to process housing benefit claims has seen Malvern Hills District Council hit a Government target.

The authority brought down the time taken to process new claims from 39 days in the first quarter of the year to 28 in the third.

The overall target was an average of 36 days. The council has beaten that by recording an average time of 35 days over the whole year.

"We're very pleased," said revenues and benefits manager Jean Mann, who attributed the success to new IT systems and hard work by staff.