In the event of a further surge of claimants when the furlough scheme ends, the Department would need to continue to process new claims for benefits, as well as providing the employment support schemes it is now delivering.18 During the initial surge in claimants the Department moved around 10,000 extra staff into claim-handling roles, and announced a recruitment drive that has since seen it hire an additional 13,500 work coaches.19 This recruitment drive has brought the number of ‘intensive work search’ claimants—those claimants expected to complete the most work search activity—that each Universal Credit work coach looks after to levels similar to that seen before the pandemic. The average intensive work search caseload was 115 in February 2020, and after rising to 224 in May 2020 and as high as 424 in Surrey and Sussex, it was at 117 in March 2021.20