child care element??

dollyrose

Hey everyone,

Just a bit of advise, I currently work full time and have 2 children. I get 14,000 and get tax credits of £300 per week which includes the child care element as I pay a provider.

I dont claim HB or council tax help but was wondering if I could? All the information is confusing, and it says you get a visit home if you apply, which is hard as i work 9-5pm. So was only going to apply if i know i would get anything. All my hol from work goes on the kids sick days!!!

Any help would be appreciated, thanks.

Ps I went on one of the calculators that said I can get £54 pw HB but it also said Tax credits count as income and I know the allowance for income must be less than £300 TC & My wages? Unless they deduct the child care element?

Its all v confusing

Macro_3

Your childcare costs are taken into account when calculating your HB/CTB entitlement.

I had a play with the figures and I think you'd have to pay about £220 a week in childcare to get £300 per week tax credits assuming your income was 14k last year too. If I then use £220 childcare costs when working out your rough entitlement to HB, assuming you earn 14k but pay no pension contributions, have no savings etc etc you'd have to pay the first £66 of your rent. So if your rent was above that, housing benefit would make up the difference. Obviously that's subject to loads of different if's and but's as the benefits system isn't anywhere near that straightforward, but in your situation entitlement to housing benefit sounds plausible.

Basically, if you've used a decent online calculator like entitledto.co.uk and it says you're entitled to something, I'd say it's defininately worth a day off work to apply.

dollyrose

Thank you!

I pay £215 child care, thats realy good they take that into account, I could have been claiming HB for the last 18 months!!

Its only that ive been playing around on the entitlement calculators that it came up, as im moving in a couple of weeks, one of my friends said I maybe better off working part-time, less child care costs ect.