Financial gift to get married...what about benefits?

star2sparkle

Thank you Sleepless Saver :-)

Mojisola

star2sparkle wrote: »

It's all because it went into her account, if it hadn't, then it would be fine.

This is exactly the point - it's the letter of the law that if you have money available to you over a certain level it will affect your benefits and you have to inform the DWP.

The DWP may be understanding when the situation is explained but it's a shame the girl got herself into this mess. Phased payments which would have kept her under £6k or direct payments from her parents to the wedding suppliers would have prevented this.

PippaGirl_2

I have been very unwell the last few years and often have been unable to leave the house. My daughter has on occasions taken my debit card and she knows my pin and she goes shopping with my card and my money. Were the parents not able to do something similar?

princessdon

Ok so parents pay for the wedding (big wedding btw).

Very confused about this and the way weddings work. The bills come in months (if not years apart). Ie you book a photographer and pay a deposit, then you book venue etc.

How did your parents know how much the wedding was going to cost or did they give an "budget".

This would mean the money in your account for some time?

Do you have receipts that prove you spent that value on the wedding?

Does your OH not work?

SandraScarlett

star2sparkle wrote: »

I hope some of you knowledgeable souls can answer this conundrum :cool:

Girl wishes to marry, she suffers from illnesses which means she claims benefits relating to that such as DLA and others, including housing benefit. Traditionally, parents pay for wedding. Her parents give her a lump sum for said wedding (takes her over the threshold of savings from a benefits point of view) and with that money, she pays for wedding, nothing else.

Is this fraud from the benefits point of view?

If she told the benefits agency, they would have stopped her benefits obviously which is unfair.

So what happens in this situation? Obviously it would be far better for the parents to have just paid for it all from their bank account but what if they aren't in that position to do so for their own reasons?

Would someone get prosecuted for fraud for effectively getting married?

Thanks!

I'm puzzled by this, because I can't understand a situation where it wasn't possible for the parents to do that. Also, as others have pointed out, you have to book things in advance, then drip-feed deposits, 50% payments, final payments, etc so was the money given to the bride years in advance of the wedding, on the understanding it would only be used for this?

If so, it's still a gift of money, and it's not that "someone would be prosecuted for fraud for effectively getting married", as you suggest, but that the bride had money that she chose to spend on a wedding, whilst still claiming benefits. Again, DLA isn't means tested.

Another way of looking at it could be that she had sufficient money not to need benefits and taxpayers footed the bill for her wedding! Is that fair?

xx

paddedjohn

OP, did the parents have this money hiding under the bed to avoid declaring it for benefits purposes?

SandraScarlett

star2sparkle wrote: »

I agree, of course, the obvious solution, but unfortunately that couldn't happen due to very serious and worrying health reasons. They could never have done it. The thing is, if they had just paid for everything then it wouldn't be considered as 'income' even though the daughter did exactly with it what they would have! So it was always their money and never her money. It is necessary, with fraud, to show the mens rea of deception/intending to be dishonest. I can't see how it can be proved in a case like this.

I still can't see how worrying health reasons prevented this. You say "it is necessary, with fraud to show the mens rea of deception" - I don't know what this means. Has the wedding already taken place?

xx

star2sparkle

Yes, I am sorry, hard to explain, the reason why it happened that way because both parents were ill, both very sadly dying of cancer, so the wedding happened very quickly and was all sorted in one day...that's why the money was transferred to her and why they couldn't do it. No one was dishonest at all. In law, you need to have a guilty intent, and she never had it. She wasn't dishonest and though she may have been the beneficial owner of the money eventually, she married for her parents benefit before they died. Yet someone was still malicious enough to report her and she is undergoing fraud investigation.

McKneff

I cant see a prosecution but she will probably have to pay some benefits back.

Pollycat

Does this girl have receipts for the reception venue, flowers, dress, cars etc?