Moving council areas - UC SDP transitional protection

siobhan12345

Good morning

I need to move 200 miles away. I have to make a decision soon about a house and the one thing worrying me is money. I'm wondering if someone can please help with some questions I have that I can't find the answers to.

I live with my partner who is moving with me. I receive the higher rate of SDP for us. I get ESA, income related, support group and PIP enhanced both my partner gets PIP standard daily living but probably wouldn't meet the criteria for the support group if assessed. He cares for me and would be entitled to carers allowance. None of our circumstances will have changed after the move other than moving into a different council area (house the same size etc).

I know I will have to end my housing benefit claim and claim universal credit. I have a few questions I'm stuck with:

1.Will my income related ESA stop as soon as I claim UC for housing costs? There is no way I can keep the ESA and claim UC just for housing costs? I think I got that right.

2. Is it better to end the HB and ESA and claim UC before or after we move? What's the best order to do it all in?

3. Is there still a mandatory 6 week wait for the first UC payment? I'm confused by potential out of date info I found while looking.

4. Regarding the transitional protection rules - in our circumstances would we qualify for it? There is nothing about moving house on the gov web page but I'm worried I will be caught out by one of the other rules -  such as must have been claiming SDP within a month of first UC payment, as 6 weeks is longer than 1 month. Maybe I've confused myself thinking too much there?

5. When I was doing benefit calculations it asked if my partner was a carer and kept trying to include a UC amount for that. He is my carer, but should I have selected no because it's just assuming he cares for someone outside of our household? As I would have thought him receiving that for caring for me would cancel out my SDP transition protection entitlement? Or can someone claim both? I wouldn't have thought so!

Thank you very much for help with this. I know these questions have probably been answered 100 x before but I can't see for looking!


Siobhan

poppy123456

1/ Your Income Related ESA will stop 2 weeks after you submit a claim for UC. You won't be able to continue with Income Related ESA after those 2 weeks because you can't just claim UC for housing costs.

If any part of your ESA is contributions based, this will continue as normal (£129.50/week) but be deducted in full from any UC entitlement.

2/ You shouldn't end either ESA or HB because if you do the 2 week run on for both will not apply.

3/ Your first payment for UC will be 1 month and 6 days after you submit your claim. You will receive your statement at the end of each assessment period. Each assessment period lasts for 30 days and starts from the date you submit your claim.

4/ When you claim UC because you're in the Support Group for ESA then you'll be entitled to the LCWRA element from the start of your claim. However, it could take a few weeks to transfer your details from ESA to UC. Once your claim is submitted you should put a message onto your journal to tell them that you're in the Support Group for ESA. If you have a letter to confirm this, it will be worth taking this with you when you have your first UC appointment because it will help to speed up the process.

Your UC will include the SDP Transitional protection of £405/month.

5/ Yes, your partner can be a carer for you, however, if he claims carers element for looking after you when you first claim UC then this will mean that you will only be entitled to single SDP TP. The rules for this are that no one must claim either carers allowance or carers element of UC for looking after you within the first assessment period. If they do then you will lose some of the TP. In your case your TP will reduce from £405/month to £285/month. You can see the amended regulations for this here. https://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2023/543/regulation/6/made

If after the first assessment period your partner claims carers element for looking after you then you will not be financially better off because the TP will erode over time. This means that if you become entitled to other elements, the TP will decrease. For you the carers element is £185.86/month, so the TP will decrease by the same amount.

If your partner doesn't claim carers element (CE) then they will be treated as a job seeker.

My thoughts on the TP and CE. If they report being your carer at the start of your claim then your TP will be £285/month and CE will be £185.86/month, total amount for both £470.86, which is more than couples SDP TP of £405/month.

If your partner went through the work capability assessment and were found to have LCWRA then you wouldn't be entitled to the extra money because you can only receive one element per claim.

I hope this helps answer your questions. If you have any further questions because it's complicated then please do ask.

Edit to add, are you aware that because you're the main claimant of the ESA claim that your partner will not be receiving any NI credits towards their state pension. Only the main claimant will receive this. When claim UC you will be receive NI credits.

Or they would receive NI credits if they were claiming carers allowance.

Jimm_Scope

Hi @siobhan12345, welcome to the scope community I know this must be a pretty stressful time. I remember having to move from Glasgow to southern England and that was stressful enough even without having to worry about certain benefits like yourself! 

Now, I don't think I can answer anything that Poppy hasn't already so I just wanted to ask how you're doing? 

I'll also put a link to our advice page which has a general overview of information about moving house while on certain  benefits Moving house, benefits and UC | Disability charity Scope UK 

siobhan12345

Thank you so so much for your response! I'm sorry I didn't come back to say so at the time, I've had a lot on my mind. This is exactly what I was looking for! Very helpful