Support Group and Savings

scotvip

Hi,  I was recently placed in the Support group and I need clarification on the rules for savings, I've read about the £6 k limit, but also I've read that savings do not come into the SG payments.          

poppy123456

Support Group has nothing to do with any savings, so you've misunderstood what you read. It will depend which ESA you're claiming. If it's either New style ESA or the old contributions based (both £129.50/week)  then both are not affected by savings/capital.

If your ESA claim started after end of December 2018 then this will be New style ESA.

If any part of it is Income Related then this is affected by savings of more than £6,000. For every £250 or part thereof over this amount there's a £1/week deduction in the ESA. For savings of more than £16,000 there's no entitlement to any means tested benefits.

If your ESA is more than £129.50/week then at least part of it will be Income Related, which is affected by savings.

apple85

I was going to create a new thread for this question but as my question is about savings on means tested benefits I’ll pop it here:

obviously I know you can’t get means tested benefits (ir-esa, housing benefit, universal credit) if your savings total over £16

and as poppy mentioned in terms of savings of more than £6,000 - every £250 or part thereof over this amount there's a £1/week deduction

ive experienced accidentally going over the £6k in the past (not the greatest experience and it was several years back, the dwp may of changed a few since)


there has got to be a few scope members whom are natural savers - whom are officially over £6k and after their monthly expenditures are slowly moving towards the £16k limit with any remaining money from their monthly benefit payment(s) rather than just finding something to spend the excess on


obviously you’d need to report savings of over £6 to the dwp initially but after that do they just want a printed screenshot of the amount of money you have in your account (or a simple total incoming £xxx and total outgoing £xxx) emailed, mailed or read over the phone)?
or would the the dwp want you to send monthly or even weekly very detailed printout of every single expenditure (retailer, store, etc…) and incoming which as has been discussed in the news recently is pretty intrusive and stressful being under that sort of microscope (especially when it’s the dwp holding the microscope)?



for the record im not in the over £6k bracket myself currently and don’t foresee being in that position in the coming months - it’s just something that my ocd head was wondering about and it doesn’t seem like a scenario often talked about online so research is failing me and I’m hoping some saving inclined scope members have first hand experience of this