Help with Health Costs - HC3

7roland8

Husband and I have been awarded a HC3 until December.

However circumstances will soon be changing as he may be off Incapacity and onto Jobseekers - but hopefully we will appeal.

I was wondering how this will affect this Health Costs benefit - as we will probably be on less money - and no mention on the form of what to do if circumstances change.

I need new glasses soon and wondered if I should get them done before the change? Don't want to be even worse off for the sake of a couple of weeks.

missapril75

Difficult to provide a link - too many PDFs:(

However I found information from several organisations that says you can continue to use the certificate if it was issued for up to a year.

It said if the cert was issued for 5 years, then the change had to be reported.

For those with a partial assistance certificate and a change reducing their income, they could reapply based on the new circumstances and then qualify for increased or full help.

Indie_Kid

If the JSA is income based, you're both entitled to full help with health costs. You don't need to fill in another HC1 form if this is the case. Your award letter for JSA is proof.

7roland8

Thanks very much both.

GlasweJen

HC3 is rarely worth the paper it's written on for glasses claims. The standard NHS voucher in Scotland for single vision glasses is £38.30 and for bifocals is £65 odd (can't remember new value off the top of my head). If the value in box B in the optical section of the form is more than this then you don't get any help at all.