HB or LHA? renting and landlord HELP PLEASE

thedarknight

Hi can anyone sort out these 2 Questions

Background:
I live with my landlord through the govs Rent -a Room Scheme. Its a 4 bedroom semi.
I am self employed, but at the moment have no income coming in so i get Housing Benefits of £50 per week. (my rent is £50pw)
The LHA Scheme is £55 per week for a shared house, BUT i am using 2 of the bedrooms, I've looked at the website for the LHA and this seems to suggest that i can have the 1 bedroom rate of up to £80 per week. (my rent will go up soon).

• When i told the council about this i was told no - I've been getting a mixed response so-far. Whats going on?

• The other Q is that the local council will have in place a "Selective License" for landlords soon that they will have to register for (£600 per house). Will this include my landlord as he only rents to me with the govs Tax Free rent-a-room scheme?

Any suggestions:doh:

lil_me

Unless you have a change in circumstances ( such as change in income & come off HB for a while) or move you will stay on HB as currently it applies to new claims

thedarknight

Yes - one of the helpful ladies at the council said that i would have to sign off HB for a week and then Re-sign on to the LHA the week after.
I did this a couple of months ago but the council assumed it was a shared house rate because i live in the same house as the landlord - i tried to explain the extra room would put me in the 1 bedroom rate but another (unhelpful) council worker signed me off and didnt put the forms through. At the end of the month i couldn't pay my rent, only then did i realize i had to re do the forms and start over on HB. I dont want the same thing to happen again, it was quite stressful.