oap savings

aphill24

Hi, My 83 yr mother has £6k savings that she wants to "hide" from the tax man or whoever else is likely to get their hands on whatever they can.She lives within her means and saves her pension etc but if she goes over 8k in savings she will lose certain benefits.
Any Ideas what I can do to help her as I have already got a cash isa in my name and my wife has so would it be wise putting it in one of my childrens savings accounts?

Molly41

It cant be hidden as it is fraudulent to do so. The DWP / local authority/ tax can check bank accounts without you knowing so would be aware of her savings and if she deliberately deprived herself of capital.

le_loup

No.
That is tax evasion and is a criminal offence.
If there are benefits involved, it could be considered deprivation of assets particularly should she need care later on.
Be very careful. Think about the morality of giving away assets in order to claim benefits.
If it were someone out of work living on a council estate, how would she feel about supporting them if they HID money in order to obtain benefits!

somethingcorporate

What you actually mean is how can you hide your mothers assets so she can claim as much from the taxpayer as possible not how can you hide it from the "taxman".

Deliberate deprivation of capital can fortunately be disregarded.

aphill24

There is nothing stopping her giving money as a gift to her grandchildren surely.She might as well spend it otherwise,why should be save it to lose out in future?

sleepless_saver

There are no benefits where having over exactly £8000 is a problem. Do a benefit check and see.

sleepless_saver

aphill24 wrote: »

There is nothing stopping her giving money as a gift to her grandchildren surely.She might as well spend it otherwise,why should be save it to lose out in future?

If she's not claiming income related benefits then she can do whatever she wants with her money. Giving money away with the intention of continuing to be able to collect benefits is not a good idea as molly41 pointed out.

atush

She should put it in an ISA.

And she should stop saving if you are worried she will go over any limits (but do check the limits as advised). She should spend money making her life easier and she can start making regular gifts out of income to the grandkids.

aphill24

Thanks for the replies,I will find out re:savings limits and claiming benefits this week.

McKneff

Its usually savings between £6k and 16K, on a sliding scale, dont know where you got the £8k from.

Nothing stopping her from spending on things to make her life more comfortable, but hiding money is fraud, so be careful.

fairleads

atush wrote: »

She should put it in an ISA.

And she should stop saving if you are worried she will go over any limits (but do check the limits as advised). She should spend money making her life easier and she can start making regular gifts out of income to the grandkids.

WR To benefits, ISAs are included in your capital. Gifting is also deprivation of assets. However, have to say this usually only becomes relevant if the council is footing the nursing home bill. Also, in this case to ISA 8K is over complicating matters.