How would an Au-pair affect my Benefits?

daska

Ah, OK, thank you for clarifying that. But thinking about it, maybe I ought to have posted it on disability and dosh, there might be someone there with a live-in carer who knows a bit more.

daska

toodles60 wrote: »

dla etc is for care for you not to help care for your child.

there is no restriction on what you can spend your DLA award on, it just acknowledges that there are hidden costs associated with being disabled like having to buy pre-prepared food, needing the heating on more because of being sedentary or not being able to access the cheapest shops or use the cheapest version of things because your hands don't work or rely on public transport because you can't get to the bus-stop. If you have solutions in place that don't cost anything then you could spend the entire amount on booze and fags. At the moment my DLA goes on food because it's the only income I've got.

astonsmummy

I think you need to seek some advice about your benefits, can you get down the CAB?
If you are not in receipt on WTC surely you have an award notice which can be shown to the DWP.
Also HB can check on their computer systems what benefits you have coming in too.

daska

They shut our local CAB which was appointment led and as I have ME travelling to the nearest one for a sit and wait would almost certainly leave me unable to cope for a few days. The DWP know I'm not getting WTC, they admitted as much when I contacted them, but... So I've written to the DWP, job centre, HMRC, HB department and SS at the local council and my MP - someone, somewhere might just get interested in sorting it out but I'm not holding my breath. I've also lost my HealthyStart vouchers because HMRC stopped my CTC because they mucked up my records.

I've got someone coming to help sort it out tomorrow but she has no experience of how an au-pair or live in carer might affect benefits so I thought I'd ask here.

lynzpower

I am not an expert, but I used to work with assessment for older people, really doing some initial assessment work regarding direct payments before a more experienced colleague went out to do full assessment and to move service user into Direct Payments ( i am a liyttle out of date I realise)

Certainly staffing seemed to be really waht the bulk of DPs was for, giving SUs choice- they didnt have to have LA approved cleaners at 15 quid an hour, if they wanted to pay a teenage neighbour for cleaning than that was the SUs choice. Likewise if the SU needed deep clean/ laundry services/ taxis/ then Dps were there for them to choose how it was spent. Many Sus I heard of later went on to emply part time live in carers ( sometimes overnighting in the spare room)

I shouldnt see that it be a problem for you to employ a Au pair based on what I knew of DPs, in fact it will work out a lot cheaper that hourly carers for the tasks that you need to have done.

Check again with your Care manager or whomever works with your budget but its my understanding ( albeit, ,it might be a little bit dated) that this should be possible.

daska

I've already cleared this with my care manager and SS are happy and reckon an au-pair would be a sensible idea. But does anyone have any experience of how this might affect HB, CTC, ESA etc

(assuming that they get reinstated before we end up living in a cardboard box and eating woodlice).

thorsoak

You might like to read this through for future reference :-

http://www.universalaupairs.com/family/about_au_pairs__nannies.html

It might help.

daska

thorsoak wrote: »

You might like to read this through for future reference :-

http://www.universalaupairs.com/family/about_au_pairs__nannies.html

It might help.

Thank you.

I'm up to speed with my responsibilities towards an au-pair, I'm looking for advice on whether it might affect the benefits I should be getting.

alwaysonthego_2

I am not entirely sure but you could ring the CAB on their helpline.

I am at work tomorrow and I can ask our welfare and benefits adviser if she is in if you can not find the answer.

daska

I've given up trying to get hold of the nearest CAB, I have tried to ring them literally hundreds of times. Unfortunately they shut our local one and replaced it with a 'HelpCentre' which can only advise on council matters. I will ask the HelpCentre but I won't have a clue if they get it wrong (which, given my experiences this year with HMRC, DWP etc is obviously not impossible) hence my asking on here.