Hi,
I’m a full time carer for my autistic son. I’m not working and receiving UC and Carer’s Allowance. From what I read on the internet, I won’t be eligible for the £650 payment as I receive Carer’s Allowance?
What help will I get then?
Thanks.
San
Receiving Carer’s Allowance will not stop you receiving the Cost of Living payment.
As long as you received some UC between the qualifying dates of 26 April 2022 to 25 May 2022 you will receive the first half of the £650 payment. It is due to go into people’s bank accounts between today and the end of July 2022.
The second half will be paid some time in the Autumn and the qualifying dates have not yet been announced.
I assume that your son is on DLA or PIP in order for you to claim Carer’s Allowance?
If yes then there will also be a payment for your son of £150 sometime in September.
What about those who haven’t transferred across from Income Support to UC?
@WhizzyWoo1954
Thank you for the info 
I haven’t received anything in my bank account so I’m a bit unsure whether I’m eligible or not. Fingers crossed.
Income support is on the list of qualifying means tested benefits. More information here:
It could go into your bank account anytime between now and the end of this month.
Hi I am an Appointee for my brother and he has had the COL Payment put into the bank. He is in a Care Home so I don’t know if he is entitled to it. I have phoned Pension Credit they say go to website and then prattle off a list of who is entitled and end call, rang his Care Home they seem to think he might be but not sure. Anyone any idea don’t want anything he is not entitled too causing problems?
I’m not sure, but when my late husband was in a nursing home he was entitled to the winter fuel bill. I checked at the time when it was paid . Whether this is any help?
What I think is incredibly unfair is that at the moment people with savings are still eligible for DLA, but once they are forced to move to UC, savings will be taken into account. So anyone who has saved for their old age, will have to live off that money until it dwindles to below the threshold and then claim UC once their savings have dropped, provided they haven’t already reached retirement age.
Once you reach retirement age, you aren’t entitled to benefits unless you are already on them before you retire, so if you’ve already lived off your savings, you’re screwed…
You have completely misunderstood how these benefits work!
DLA is NOT a means tested benefit and is still paid to people who also claim Universal Credit. It is not taken off their Universal Credit.
Of course you are still entitled to claim benefits once you reach State Retirement age. People who are receiving DLA or PIP when they reach State Pension age will continue to receive it.
Alternatively they can claim Attendance Allowance which is a disability benefit for people over State Pension Age.
If their income is below a certain threshold they can claim Pension Credit which has no savings limit. Although the Pension Credit is reduced if savings are over £10,000. If Pension Credit is received then they do not have to pay any Council Tax and are eligible for Housing Benefit if applicable.
Even if no Pension Credit is received they can still qualify for Council Tax Reduction and Housing Benefit.
Yes I do know if a person is already on a legacy benefit when they reach retirement age that they can continue to receive them once retired; hence I did say “unless you are already on them before you retire.”
None of what you have said changes the fact that UC is proportionally reduced according to savings amount and stopped altogether if over the threshold.
Pension credit is means tested if savings are over £10k
The point I was trying to make is that people who may have worked for much of their lives and bothered to save, are penalised once their health suffers and they have to claim benefits, simply because they may have savings which were earmarked for their old age. The £16k threshold may sound like a lot, but soon disappears if that is what you are living on.
Benefits have always been designed to make sure people use their savings first. In the old days of the Poor Laws, this was an absolute. You had to use every penny first and were expected to sell stuff off, too. If you had what they decided was too much furniture, you had to sell off the excess. It was brutal.
The Welfare State scrapped all that, at least to some extent. But some of the principles carried over, including how savings were used.
But the majority of people using the Welfare State and the current benefits system have been people who have lived from hand to mouth - their wages were low and there were few opportunities to save at all, so when things went wrong they’ve had nothing to fall back on.
But attitudes are entrenched and still think “Poor Law.” So if you smoke, you’re a bad person and not really in need. If you have a telly - “big flat screen TV”, you are profligate and should have saved. The fact that these days all you can buy is a flat screen TV and most stores don’t stock smaller screens is forgotten.
And every change to the Welfare State from 1988 onwards has moved back towards the old Poor Law approach. Although the biggest change came in during the early 70s, when people were stuck with the three day week and needed help to pay the bills, so Family Income Support came in as a temp measure. Successive governments kept it running (in different forms) because it helped keep the unemployment figures down.
The problem with that was that it effectively subsidised bad employers. Which is why most people on benefits these days are working. But because most people don’t really know about this, they assume that most people on benefits are unemployed. And therefore lazy.
Which, of course, the politicians are happy for us all to believe, so they can make the system as difficult to navigate as possible “because fraud.” But that one is very much another story.