LHA- amount of hours worked /money earned affect lha benefit?

zaralondon

Hey all,

I want to find out the exact effect the amount of hours worked would have on housing benefit/LHA payments made to me.

I know if I claimed JSA I would have all my rent paid, but it would obviously be better to work in order to get more than 64 pounds for living. Is there anywhere that I can go to work out how much lha is awarded in relation to the exact amount of hours or amount of money earned. I really do not want to get stuck in a benefits trap where I am forced not to work in order to secure rent money.
Thanks guys!!

fluffymovie

Hi Zaralondon

LHA rates vary across the country and so it is useful to go onto your local authorities website would be the best place to start.

Most have a benefit calculator on there so you can play around with figures etc.

Good luck

Indie_Kid

It would also depend on how much per hour you're on too.

You may not get all your rent paid with LHA - the amount is set by the council.

zaralondon

Thanks guys,

I'll look for one of the calculators and play around with the numbers as you said and see what the figures are.

ragz_2

LHA is usually awarded based on your "applicable amount" - ie the amount of money they think you/your household needs to live on. Then your eligible rent is worked out. If for example your rent was £100 a week and they decided all of it was eligible and you earned only enough to cover your "applicable amount", you would get £100 a week LHA. If you earned £50 a week more than your applicable amount then your LHA is reduced accordingly by a percentage of the excess. In my area it's 65% so for example if I earned an extra £100 a month, my LHA would go down by 65% of that so I'd be £35 a month better off.

That's probably not 100% right but should give you an idea of how they work it out, if you are already claiming LHA it should say on the paperwork what your applicable amount it and how much of your rent is eligble and you can work out exactly how much you'd get if your income increased 9though you'll need a calculator lol)

HTH