LHA - payments/frequency/levels HELP!

alexiawest

I live in private rented shred accomodation. I have just been told that I am awarded LHA at £57.59 p/w, I was wondering if someone could help with some questions I have....

1. LHA is paid 4 weekly am I right? And it is awarded on a weekly basis. My rent is to be paid monthly at £270 so how does that work because there are 52 weeks in a year so I will get 52 payments of LHA buti pay my rent monthly and there are not always 4 weeks in a month, so surely it will mean I will get paid more weeks of LHA than my landlord requests?

Sorry if thats confused, you, its confused me. Its just that someone mentioned it to me today as she is in a similar situation and says that she will actually end up with money in her pocket!


2. Can anyone tell me more about LHA levels? When I was making my claim a few people on here told me that because I am disabled and recieve mid rate care DLA I am entitled to a 1 bed self contained rate of LHA where as those who are not disabled and are my age ( under 25 ) can usually only get shared accomodation rate, however it seems I have only been awarded the shared accomodation rate.

3. Finally, does LHA HAVE to be paid monthly in arrears? Will the council consider paying any other way? Its just that my rent agreement says I have to pay rent in advance not in arrears. If it is the case that they only pay in arrears, is there any chance of getting paid more regularly than 4 weekly so that I can keep my landlord happy and her not have to wait so long for payments? She has been really good to me and has let me live here without paying for 6 or 7 weeks now and I feel really bad that I have been here that long yet the payment I am going to be giving her when it goes into my account 2mora will only cover 4 weeks rent and she will have to wait for the next lot.


I hope someone can help, I know that some of those who generously give their time on here do work in the benefits department in various councils, and any help and advice given is very much appriciated.

julie03

we get our lha fortnightly and it is in arrears. my landlord is fine about it and we pay him every 28 days. ask your landlord if you can do this.

alexiawest

See if I could get it fornightly that would help, I get mine every 4 weeks according to my award letter, fortnightly in arrears would reduce the pressure a bit as it would mean that I am only 2 weeks behind in the rent rather than 4.

How did you go about getting your paid fortnightly? Was it easy to arrange?

Thanks

julie03

our local authority automatically pay fortnightly. maybe others are different. phone them up and ask,

fluffymovie

Hi there

I would suspect that it is an error on the part of the HB department as we always pay claimants 2 weeks in arrears.

As regards the payments, basically, they would explain it like this I think.

Your rent is £270 per month = £3240 per year (multiply by 12)
If we were to assume you were on full HB as you have not said, but that would mean that your LHA should be around £63.31 per week or £126.62 per fortnight.
In 1 year, you would get 26 payments of £126.62 which would equal £3292.12. This is because there are more than exactly 52 weeks in a year so the extra is for those extra days so as you can see, you would get more HB than rent.

As regards the Shared room rate, check your notification letters as from my calculations, you should be entitled to the One bed rate. This would mean that if you were on full HB, depending on the rate for a 1 bed in your area, you would be entitled to your rent plus up to £15 per week on top as a reward as it were for finding accomodation cheaper than you are entitled to.

I would check your letters carefully and ensure that you have been awarded the Severe Disability premium as it sounds as though this may have been missed by the assessor loading the LHA rate.

LHA is complicated and you did have a few queries but hope that I have answered as many of them as possible for you.

I always say, if in doubt, contact your council.

cifpower

I get my LHA paid fortnightly in arrears so I would ask your council if this is possible.

hippy-chicy

When paid to the claimant HB is always paid two weekly in arreas. It cannot be paid in advance so if you are being paid 4 weekly you need to contact your LA to get your payment frequency changed over.

With regard to the SDP It could be that the OP is not entitled to the SDP, for example if someone is in receipt of Carers Allowance for them then they wouldn't be awarded the SDP. This is not clear from the OP original post.

elaina79

I get mine paid 4 weeks in arrears.

alexiawest

Hi

To make it clearer regarding the severe disability, this is my situation....

I am 21 years old.
I live in a bedsitting room in a large house where a couple, a single gent and the owner also occupy rooms. We share a kitchen and bathroom. I am classed as licing alone ( at least thats what DWP said when I claimed income support, because we all maintain seperate households and our living space is our bedsitting rooms ).
I recieve these benefits....
incapacity benefit £102.24 p/w ( this is long term with age addition I believe )
Disability living allowance low rate mobility
Disability living allowance medium rate care
Income support - this is an income top up of £21.90 per week as I live alone+ no-one gets carers allowance for me so I qualify for the disability premiums.

The award letter says this....

your weekly benefit award is £57.69
first payment will be made on 17 march 2009
benefit starts from 1st march
method of payment BACS
Frequency of payment 4 weeks arrears


In working out your weekly benefit we have used the following information

financial details
your weekly earned income 0.00
partners earned income £0.00
any other income £164.85
assumed income from £243 capital 0.00
total weekly income £164.85
disregarded income £62.60
less expenses £0.00

Income used in calculation £102.25

Applicable amount

single person allowance under 25 £47.95
Disability premium ( single ) £25.85
severe disability premium ( single ) £50.35

This information is al;l repeated various times throughtout the 3 pages, on the statement of reasons it says ...

Your benefit award is based on a local housing allowance of £57.69.
The size criteria used is 1 bedroom shared.

Can anyone make any sense of it? Does this make it any clearer to those of you who have replied and seem to have a good knowledge of LHA?

I will ask if I can be changed to 2 weekly in arrears as that would really help things.

I do get full LHA for my area ( Im in Norwich ), it would go up to £98ish if I were to get the 1 bed self contained rate, but I have no idea what makes you qualify as having severe disability, before people on here have said that being on med or high dla care but perhaps its only those on high rate care?

If I could get the 1 bed self contained rate I could move into a flat which would be much better for me as I have anxiety disorder and living around other people makes things very difficult.

Thanks for all the help and advice so far.

hippy-chicy

From what you have put there it looks like you have been awarded the SDP, so should have been awarded the one room rate. I am just going to have another look to see what the guidance says.

To be awarded the SDP you need to be in receipt of med/ high rate DLA, live on your own and no one can be n receipt of carers allowance for looking after you. It looks like you meet these criteria.

hippy-chicy

This is what the guidance states :

Single claiminats aged under 25 years ( i.e young individuals) who do not have a non dependent living or treated as living with them will be entitled to the standard rate for a bedroom in a shared accommodation.

Note: This does not apply to under 25s who have the severe disability premium included in their benefit assessment and certain people under the age of 25 are not classes as a young individual e.g certain care leavers less than 22 years of age. They will be entitled to the one-bedroom rate of LHA regardless of the size of the accommodation.