How to answer this question?

senDad

Hello All

In a nutshell, my mother in law has fled the war in Ukraine and is now looking after my son who has a severe disability.

We first applied for the Carers Element of UC but were told she can't claim that because someone else is looking after him. The Carers Allownace people have since confirmed that is not the case. Then she received this:

Hi H, 

both G and V are registered as part of <Moderator removed name> Carers allowance claim.
<Moderator removed name> would need to contact carers allowance to remove one of the children from his claim.  
As it stands you will not be eligible for the carers element of Universal credit 

Kind regards
<Moderator removed contact details>

Then someone on this forum kindly told me this was not true as one person can't claim for looking after two people.

Finally we got this message today:

Hi H, 

is there a reason that you have not applied for carers allowance in relation to your
 grandson if you are now providing full time care for him? 

Kind regards
<Moderator removed contact details>

In fact we did apply last week but my understanding is she can go down either route and it won't make any difference to the overall amount she receives ?


It feels to me like they are doing everything they can to prevent her claiming for some reason? How should we answer the latest question? We seem to have lost all confidence in this person <Moderator removed contact details> as she previously provided such apparently basic and incorrect information.

Any thoughts, help or reassurance would be very gratefully received.

Thanks.

poppy123456

She doesn't need to claim carers allowance to be entitled to carers element. You're correct that there will be no financail gain to claiming carers allowance. The only difference is class 1 NI credits will be received from carers allowance and only class 3 from UC.

senDad

Thank you very much for that and apologies for missunderstanding you on my previous first post. My only excuse is looking after two of them is exhausting - especially with all the ehcp/tribunals/dla/etc.

It seems as if this "case worker" is giving me incorrect advice and asking me questions that don't appear to be relevant to my MIL's claim for carers element. Has anyone dealt with such a person like that before or are they all like that or know how we should best handle it ?

Community_Scope

Hello @senDad

I'm glad to hear your mother in law is now living safely in the UK and can't imagine what a difficult time you've all had to endure. After that, it must be frustrating to come up against barriers to claiming benefits that you're duly entitled to. I'm sorry this has been your experience.

In terms of the last message, you could ask the case manager to share the guidance being used by this particular worker, so prompting them to take a look or reply with the correct guidance as Poppy advised - that you don't need to claim carer's allowance to receive carer element. Whilst, if you remain unhappy with the service you've received, you could follow the complaints procedure.

We also just want to let you know we’ve edited your comment because it contained personal identifiable information such as names. For more information about why we removed this, please consider our online community house rules.

All the best,

Cher

Online community team

calcotti

As advised by poppy whether or not Carers Allowance (CA) is claimed alongside UC makes no difference financially. Although people can claim CA they are not obliged to. Some people would prefer to have their income split between UC and CA because they are paid on different payment cycles which can make budgeting more difficult. For people who work there is an earnings limit that applies for CA but not for the carer element so some people are eligible for the carer element even though they could not claim CA.

Given the background of being forced to move to a different country and grappling with a new bureaucracy it is completely logical, in my opinion, to keep things simple (in theory) by only claiming UC.
 
DWP own guidance on carer element is here
https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/1015113/admf6.pdf

Note in particular

F6010 To qualify for an award of a carer element, the claimant must have regular and substantial caring responsibilities for a severely disabled person.

F6011 A UC claimant will have regular and substantial caring responsibilities for a severely disabled person1 where they

1. satisfy the conditions of entitlement to CA (see F6013) or

2. would satisfy the conditions of entitlement to CA if their earnings did not exceed the prescribed limit for CA. This means that a UC claimant will qualify for the carer element irrespective of their earnings, provided they satisfy the other conditions of entitlement for CA (see the Note to F6013).

No claim for CA necessary

F6012 The test at F6011 can be satisfied whether or not the claimant has made a claim for CA. Where no claim for CA has been made, the UC DM will have to consider whether the claimant could satisfy the conditions for entitlement to CA.

senDad

Thank you once again to all for your advice and apologies for using the first name of the person dealing with the UC carers allowance claim. We now have this new message sent today. Is this apparently informal message sufficient for her to request a "mandatory reassessment" as the first step in the complaints process? We are obviously not happy that this person has previously provided obviously wrong information (one person caring for two people).

Does she simply not believe us? Maybe she thinks that we managed as a family before my mother in law arrived so we can carry on like that. One of the twins is totally non-verbal at nearly 6 with zero sign despite training every day of ever getting out of nappies. The other doing better but still with a lot of communication problems. Perhaps the lady in UC would benefit from some work experience to understand carers and their situations better? She would be welcome here to help look after our two.

Any more to the point should we request this mandatory reassessment or just swallow it and wait for carers allowance themselves? Meantime I just hope she doesn't get called _again_ to have to go to the job centre as its a 5 mile car journey, she doesn't drive and would find it very difficult to navigate a bus journey (due to language and age).

we are having difficulty verifying that you are providing care for your Grandson. We will need to wait until carers allowance is in payment to you before we will be able to verify that you are caring for him. 

I understand that you have advised that your son in law is not caring for G, however, we can only currently see that G is linked to M <Me, the father>  and not yourself through carers allowance. Once carers allowance is in payment we will be able to verify that you are the one providing care for G. 

Kind regards

H

Case Manager

poppy123456

Request the MR on the decision not to pay carers element because you simply do not need to claim carers allowance to be entitled to carers element, that's nonesense.

The fact that 2 adults live in the same house caring for 2 children is irrelevant because you can both claim seperately for each individual child.

For a case manager to say that to you is absurd! If it was me then i'd also be putting in a complaint about that case manager. https://england.shelter.org.uk/housing_advice/benefits/how_to_complain_about_universal_credit

calcotti

poppy123456 said:

Request the MR on the decision not to pay carers element because you simply do not need to claim carers allowance to be entitled to carers element, that's nonesense. 

If you do as poppy suggests I suggest that you make reference to the guidance I quoted in an earlier reply,

Adeline

Sorry if I am missing the obvious @senDad but has she made the change to her account to report being a carer? Asking on the journal rarely gets anywhere but when you go to report a change and make the change yourself, the process is largely automated and it would take a case manager sitting and manually overriding the request to deny it.
When you report the change it should come up with a screen to ask who she cares for, then confirm what benefits the person she cares for receives (DLA and so on). 

I just wondered if when you said she applied whether you simply put the request on her journal or went throgh the changes and automated steps.

senDad

Adeline - no she hadn't done that ! Thanks for pointing it out. It may be obvious to some but not to us. Of course when she applied for UC she also applied for the care element at the same time so we assumed "tell us of a change" wouldn't apply to us.

I'm hesitant now to either do that or complain. Not at all because I'm ignoring the advice but because even though its against all the rules as you've kindly pointed out, I'm thinking we might be better to just let the Carers Allowance application run its course. Thankfully we are not desperate for the carers element/allowance payment and can help our extended family until it gets sorted. What we really want to avoid though are the work meetings. The UC people yesterday have cancelled the next "work coach meeting" and my hope is they will not apply pressure until the result of the Carers Allowance comes through. It says it takes up to 6 weeks (or longer) - is that about right do you think? That would mean 4 weeks left as we applied 2 weeks ago.

Once she gets accepted on CA, then my thoughts are to complain about that particular UC case manager. I would do that because there may be other people in a more precarious situation than us or not know the rules or know how to find out what they are (as I've done through the great help on this forum). It would really be pretty low if Ukranian refugees (or anyone for that matter else satisfying the requirements) who are working very hard looking after a disabled child (or adult) are refused the support from CA/CE due to wrong decisions taking by a case manager. I wonder how many carers this case manager has forced off carers element and forced into potentially spending hours every week commuting to pointless job coach meetings ultimately ending in sanctions due to being unable to work as looking after a disabled person.

As I understand correctly, I need to complain within 1 month from when a decision was taken? I hope that the CA decision comes back before then.

calcotti

I have heard of Carers Allowance claims taking up to six months.

poppy123456

senDad said:

Adeline - no she hadn't done that ! Thanks for pointing it out. It may be obvious to some but not to us. Of course when she applied for UC she also applied for the care element at the same time so we assumed "tell us of a change" wouldn't apply to us.

When she first applied for UC if she told them she cares for your son then there would be no changes to report because she's already done that.

Glitterbug

Hi, have you tried citizens advice? (Apologies if you have) My friend is currently in the process of a complaint/ appeal and they have been really helpful. I hope you get sorted!