Claiming Income Support?

Irn-Bru-Kid

I would appreciate some help on behalf of my inlaws if at all possible.

My father in law is currently self employed but has been unable to work for the past four months through illness. He has just had another note from the doctor covering the next two months and it is highly unlikely that he will be able to return to work in the forseeable future.

He is hoping to claim income support if possible. But there are a few problems with the application regarding savings and property.

In March this year they inherited approx 18k. This has now gone. The majority went to their kids, pay off a bit of debt and they have lived off it since he was unable to work. On the application form, it is asking if you have had savings in the last six months. Do they need to mention this money? It may be a silly question, but I'm not entirely sure.

Now, they are due to inherit approx 30k after the sale of a recently deceased family member house. The house has not been sold as yet and it will be sometime before they will get this money. Do they need to mention this in the application?

The application asks if you or your partner currently own/jointly own any other property. Where do they stand with regards to the house that is currently up for sale. They are not on the deeds and it is still in the relatives name.

Obviously we want to tell the truth, but we don't want to bog down the application process supplying information we don't need to.

If you need anything further, please let me know

Many thanks

recoverydust

Unless I am mistaken your inlaws need to claim employment support allowance. ESA, which is for people that can't work due to illness.
The savings that have been spent may well be considered deprivation of capital, but someone with better knowledge will come along. When the 30k is inherited it will have to be declared and will probably mean that no benefit is payable.
HTH

HappyMJ

Yes they need to declare the 18k they had in March as it's less than 6 months ago. The timing of the payment and the timing of the illness is very important as both are 4 months ago. If it appears he got rid of the money to get benefits then he won't get benefits.

pmlindyloo

May I ask how old your FIL is? Depending on his age he may be entitled to claim a different benefit.

Also, has he been paying NI contributions for the last couple of years?

Irn-Bru-Kid

pmlindyloo wrote: »

May I ask how old your FIL is? Depending on his age he may be entitled to claim a different benefit.

Also, has he been paying NI contributions for the last couple of years?

He is 54 and with regards to NI, he isn't quite up to date.

pmlindyloo

These are the rules for claiming contribution based ESA:

The first contribution condition for contributory Employment and Support Allowance (ESA) is that you must have actually paid Class 1 or 2 national insurance contributions in one of the last three tax years before you claim. However, you may be able to satisfy this condition with contributions paid in any tax year, if you haven’t been able to pay contributions recently - for example, because you were getting Carer’s Allowance or Incapacity Benefit, or if you were getting Working Tax Credit with a disability element before you became incapable of work.
The second condition is that you must either have paid or been credited with contributions for the last two tax years before you claim. However, credited contributions will not always count towards this condition.

From what you say he is unlikely to be entitled to contribution based ESA. However, if he applies then they will see if he is eligible based on his NI contributions (difficult to say for sure since it is a mite complicated) This is not means tested.

So it looks as if he will have to claim income based ESA. As already said this might be complicated because of his inheritance and how it was spent.

Dunroamin

Doesn't your MIL work?

von

He can claim Employment & Support Allowance which is split into Contribution-based i.e. based on the NI he has paid in 2009/10 and 2010/11. If he was paying Class 2 NI for the whole of this period he should qualify. This is payable at £71.00 per week.
He could also claim Income-Based ESA which is payable at £111.45 per week (this will top up his Cont based ESA). He should declare the property which is up for sale and any capital he has held in the last 6 months. I can't tell you whether he would be entitled to Income-Based ESA as you haven't supplied enough information. See link re how to claim http://www.direct.gov.uk/en/moneytaxandbenefits/benefitstaxcreditsandothersupport/illorinjured/dg_172014.

real1314

If he hasn't been able to work for 4 months (ie since March) why did he give away some of the £18k he got (in March) and how has he managed to spend the rest?

Few people unable to work would give away money when they had no income.
He's certainly going to have to get used to making £18k last a lot longer than 4 months, as it's unlikely he'll get any means tested benefits. He needs to declare the £18k as failing to do so could be deemed fraud. He will also have to declare the pending inheritance, both now as a pending amount and when he actually receives any of the money from the estate. :cool: