In 2012 I loaned Mum £180K. She was 82 at the time.
I did not ask her to pay interest, but Mum insisted that she continue with the £3K annual Xmas gift that she had given me since 2001 to partially compensate me for the interest that I could have been receiving had I kept the money and deposited it in my own savings account. The gift also helped cover the costs that I was incurring in looking after Mum, and I was happy that there were no tax implications for me, which would have been the case had I charged interest.
Over the ensuing decade, I helped Mum deposit the cash in high interest savings accounts which yielded an estimated additional £50K, bringing her funds up to nearly £230K. It is these funds that have been used to pay Mum’s care home fees over the past nearly 3 years, but the money is now beginning to run out and I need to contact the local authority for help.
However, I am concerned about how the local authority (Hampshire County Council) will view the £3K gift annual gift when they do their financial assessment.
Is there any paperwork relating to the loan?
I can’t see that giving you £3k can be seen as a “gift” when mum owes you so much. Surely it’s a tiny loan repayment.
I also live in Hampshire. They seriously mucked up arrangements when my mum moved to a care home from hospital. To cut a long story short I reclaimed £8,000 from them as the correct rules were not applied, but only after going to a meeting in Winchester with a very unpleasant woman tried to bully me. Bad idea. She then insisted I’d signed a form when I knew I hadn’t. Ultimately he colleague stepped in and said if I went to the Ombudsman he would see they hadn’t followed proper procedures.
Hindsight is a wonderful thing, but if mum couldn’t afford the home herself either
- The council would have paid instead.
- The council could have paid for most of the care, and you would only pay a top up, in exceptional circumstances.
- If mum is very ill, she should have had an NHS Continuing Healthcare Assessment giving entirely free care.
Yes, I solicitor prepared document to confirm the loan. I think that any reasonable person would see that there has been no ‘deprivation of assets’ here since Mum has benefited greatly from the loan. However, I am trying to get a feel of how reasonable HCC are when they encounter grey areas like this.
Thank you for sharing your experience. I will take care with my dealings with HCC and keep a full paper trail of our interactions. I am prepared to appeal if I consider their decisions unfair, but I could do without the stress of it all.
Many thanks.
In that case, have a copy of the agreement readily available at a financial assessment. I’ve done many for my disabled son and mum. Normally the assessment staff are very good, there is a special department and visiting staff I’ve met have come from banking. I always print off copies of the bank statement and benefit letters in advance to give to them. They love this! (Keep a second set stapled together for an “Assessment” file).
Usually at the time of the assessment they give you a hand written calculation of ant contribution, confirmed formally later.
From my experiences, never believe what an HCC social worker tells you about anything related to money!