LCWRA and UC- been dismissed

Shoots

Hello,

I hope everyone is well.

I am feeling confused about a few things and debating what to do. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Background- I have been off work since November 2024 for my mental health. I have recently been assessed and awarded LCWRA. I have an 8 year old autistic son who can only attend school for an hour a day. He requires a lot of care and attention through the day and night.

My employer has recently dismissed me. They have asked me how I would like to be paid;

3 payments- August, September and October (when my contract will officially end anyway)

1 lump sum payment (which i think will affect my UC for 2 months due to the amount)

Will the payments affect my LCWRA?

How will it work?

I'm getting myself worried about things.

Thank you

Lauren29

If you have been assessed and awarded LCWRA the payments from your ex employer won't affect your LCWRA.

Kimi87

UC is means tested so any lump sum payments will affect your UC award (with UC entitlements are added up before any deductions are made).

I'm not aware of an exemption to this for being on LCWRA.

Happy to be corrected but my advice would be to stick with the 3x monthly payments.

Charlie_Scope

It is difficult to advise which would be better financially without knowing the amounts the money would come to or what the money is classed as. For example is it wages in lieu of notice? Accrued holiday pay? Redunancy pay?

Also lump sum may be enough to only impact one month, or if high enough, spread across multiple (classed as 'surplus earnings'), but it would depend on how much they were and what your UC award before deductions is.

Shoots

https://forum.scope.org.uk/discussion/comment/1049545#Comment_1049545

Hi Charlie,

Thank you for your reply.

I am due 12 weeks notice of termination at £3610.80 and holiday accrued at £1110.47.

I get the following UC;

Standard £400.14

Housing £656.87

Children £339

Disabled Child £158.76

ESA £423.27

If you could let me know your thoughts it would be much appreciated.

Thank you so much

Charlie_Scope

Hello @Shoots

Thank you for the information, from what you have said all of the money would be regarded as income.

Your UC before deductions is £1978.04, meaning the amount that would zero your UC claim is: £3596.44 a month.

For surplus earnings to be considered, they would need to be £2500 or more on top of the £3596.44. So if you took it in one go, it would zero your award for that month, but you should not have deductions the next month.

Do you know if they planned to split the accrued holiday pay across the 3 payments equally?

Shoots

https://forum.scope.org.uk/discussion/comment/1049680#Comment_1049680

Thank you for the information.

They haven't said specifically about the split just, one lump payment or split over 3. Would that make a difference?

Charlie_Scope

Working under the assumption the amounts you've shared are after tax, NI and any pension contribution:

If they add the amounts together (accrued holiday and notice pay) and split them evenly across the 3 months, I believe you would be paid £1573.76 each month from work and have £639.52 deducted from your UC each of those months for your earnings.

Or as a lump sum, you would have 1 month of £0 UC and the other two without deductions for earnings.

Shoots

https://forum.scope.org.uk/discussion/comment/1049706#Comment_1049706

Thank you so much for your help.

If I took it over 3 months, would it affect my ESA (LCWRA)?