Carers Allowance - UC

Lola16

A quick question. Today I have made an application for Carer's Allowance - husband gets PIP and New Style ESA. I know it will be deducted from our UC claim like my husband's ESA.

My question is should I inform the UC team via the Journal that I have applied for CA or will they be informed automatically ? If I must inform them, is it for the attention of a Work Coach ?

Have claimed in order to get the class 1 NI contributions - a safety net in case, God forbid, I fall ill too.

Thank you

poppy123456

You don't need to tell them because they will know. Does your UC include the carers element? If not then you'll need to report a change of circumstances. Then click caring for someone and then report it through there. Your UC maximum entitlement will then increase by £185.86/month.

Lola16

Yes our claim already includes the Carer element. Will it now cause an issue the fact that I didn't apply for CA at the same time as UC ? We only started getting UC last month and I didn't know much about all this. 

poppy123456

No there will be no issues. If the carers allowance is backdated to at least when you started claiming UC then there will be an overpayment for UC which will need to be repaid back. This is because carers allowance will pay what they owe you as a lump sum which causes an overpayment for UC. You can either pay it back as a lump sum or they will reduce your future payments to pay it back.

Your CA can take anything up to about 12 weeks, sometimes longer.

Lola16

I didn't ask for a backdate. I simply put today as the effective date of the claim.

Our UC claim started on 12 May 2023 - assessment period 12th to 11th.

So what will happen in that case ?

Thank you for your time on this 

Lola16

Actually began caring 35 hours on 20 April and put this as one of the answers to the questions but today is the date of the claim.

poppy123456

There will still be an overpayment of UC and the same applies as i advised above (sorry i should have made that clear in my above comment). This is because when someone claims CA as well as UC both departments don't contact each other to arrange for the overpayment to be paid straight to UC. CA will just pay you what they owe you from the date you put down on the form.

Lola16

So to be quite clear - I will get a lump sum payment in the future calculated from today's date  - not from the date our UC claim began as I put today as the start date of the CA claim. This lump sum will then be paid by CA and at the same time deducted from UC ?

Lola16

I think I have got it - I can ask for the UC overpayment ( the CA lump sum as it were ) to be taken incrementally from our monthly UC payment. Will I be contacted through the Journal about this when the time comes ?

poppy123456

There wont be an overpayment of UC from the start of your claim because you haven’t asked for it to be backdated. It will only be from when your claim starts from. 

Lola16 said:

I think I have got it - I can ask for the UC overpayment ( the CA lump sum as it were ) to be taken incrementally from our monthly UC payment. Will I be contacted through the Journal about this when the time comes ?

Yes for both questions.

Lola16

Thank you for your time once again. Dealing with the heat, my poor husband and the maze that is the benefits system is all too much ! 

Best wishes to you 

L_Volunteer

It does sound like rather a lot to have to go through @Lola16. How are you coping with everything at the moment? Please don't hesitate to let us know if there's anything we can do to help