Benefits entitlement --- Can I deduct unpaid debt from the declared savings?

jlawrence

zagfles wrote: »

You can, if you have a flexible mortgage. Just overpay your mortgage with your savings. Though it might be viewed as deprivation if you do it while claiming benefits!

It's generally daft to build up savings in the first when you have a mortgage - just get a flexible mortgage and overpay instead of saving - you can withdraw the overpayments if you need to, you won't pay any tax on savings interest (you save interest on your mortgage instead) and you have no actual savings if you ever need to claim benefits.

Hi, try doing that with no income coming in.

jlawrence

Housing_Benefit_Officer wrote: »

If the claimant paid their overdraft and their credit card arrears then they are treated as no longer being the beneficial owner of £20,000 and that they have nil capital. Doing that could open up an investigation of deprivation of capital however.

Thank you, by which time there would be no capital or savings left and more than likely no income either as you would be treated as still having the capital.

zagfles

jlawrence wrote: »

Hi, try doing that with no income coming in.

Whoosh. I was talking about overpaying the mortgage as an alternative to saving. If you have money to save, you have money to overpay the mortgage.

jlawrence

GirlFromMars wrote: »

Um ... an Age UK advisor is not a DWP Decision Maker. The only person who can make a decision in your case is a DWP decision maker. Write to the DWP laying out your case and ask for a decision from a Decision Maker.

Go and read my first thread on the forum, I was in a very similar position as you, having been told by a benefits advisor that what I was planning to do was Deprivation of Capital (and everyone other than HBO on the forum agreed that what I was doing was DOC).

However when I spoke to DWP/Local Authority Decision Makers it turned out that they were totally happy with what I was planning to do with my money, and gave me a written decision stating that what I planned to do was not Deprivation of Capital.

The advice is that the only person who can give you a decision is the DWP Decision Maker.

Nobody else can make this decision including an Age UK advisor, or anybody else on this forum.

Write to the DWP stating your case and see what they have to say, they may tell you to live off the capital, but they might not, so don't complain until you have actually been given a decision from the person who counts.

Many thanks, I have now read about your situation which is a little different to mine. Maybe I can understand things better if I asked you a couple of questions?
Did you point out to the DWP that one of your aims was to secure a means tested benefit after you had bought the property and could only do so if the capital was disregarded?
I understand the main objective was to have the money disregarded as it was to be used to help buy your new home. Did you tell the DWP that you were fully aware of the DOC regulations and needed to get round them otherwise you couldn't move?


In my case the facts are that we need an income - Income Based ESA. That is a priority. To get to that point, we need to have the DWP agree that either paying off the mortgage early or having the capital treated as needed to pay off the mortgage in 6 years time. Our clear and truthful objective is to somehow get round the DOC regulations that will enable us to claim these means tested benefits. I would also mention that the bulk of the £100,000 represents Personal Injury awards for both of us that were paid over 5 years ago. These it seems are not disregarded al all.

tomtom256

jlawrence wrote: »

Many thanks, I have now read about your situation which is a little different to mine. Maybe I can understand things better if I asked you a couple of questions?
Did you point out to the DWP that one of your aims was to secure a means tested benefit after you had bought the property and could only do so if the capital was disregarded?
I understand the main objective was to have the money disregarded as it was to be used to help buy your new home. Did you tell the DWP that you were fully aware of the DOC regulations and needed to get round them otherwise you couldn't move?


In my case the facts are that we need an income - Income Based ESA. That is a priority. To get to that point, we need to have the DWP agree that either paying off the mortgage early or having the capital treated as needed to pay off the mortgage in 6 years time. Our clear and truthful objective is to somehow get round the DOC regulations that will enable us to claim these means tested benefits. I would also mention that the bulk of the £100,000 represents Personal Injury awards for both of us that were paid over 5 years ago. These it seems are not disregarded al all.

You have the money. you have access to the money, ergo it will not be disregarded.

You can hijack as many threads as you like, but the facts will remain the same.

As you have over £16k in capital you will not be entitled to any means tested benefits unless you commit fraud.

If you go down this route you will be caught and will end up with a hefty overpayment and potentialy a criminal record.

How many more times do you need to be told the same thing?

GirlFromMars_2

jlawrence wrote: »

Many thanks, I have now read about your situation which is a little different to mine. Maybe I can understand things better if I asked you a couple of questions?
Did you point out to the DWP that one of your aims was to secure a means tested benefit after you had bought the property and could only do so if the capital was disregarded? I understand the main objective was to have the money disregarded as it was to be used to help buy your new home. Did you tell the DWP that you were fully aware of the DOC regulations and needed to get round them otherwise you couldn't move?

Yes, the DWP knew I wasn't claiming IR benefits, but that I would be after buying the property. As it turned out in my situation I didn't realise the property would already have been disregarded as a result of my disabled brother living there, so due to an appeal that I'd just won I was able to claim IR benefits backdated for the previous year.

I would have been unable to buy a property if they didn't disregard the capital, and they knew this, and they knew I was aware of Deprivation of Capital by the point that I wrote to them.

In my case the facts are that we need an income - Income Based ESA. That is a priority. To get to that point, we need to have the DWP agree that either paying off the mortgage early or having the capital treated as needed to pay off the mortgage in 6 years time. Our clear and truthful objective is to somehow get round the DOC regulations that will enable us to claim these means tested benefits. I would also mention that the bulk of the £100,000 represents Personal Injury awards for both of us that were paid over 5 years ago. These it seems are not disregarded al all.

Ultimately your primary focus isn't to have an income, it's to keep your property in six years time. You could very easily live off your capital until it is gone, but you would have to move when your mortgage becomes due.

The £100K personal injury payment would have been disregarded if you had put it into a trust during the first year after you received it, and would probably have been disregarded if you used it to buy your house instead of getting caught up in a totally irrational mortgage situation.

I have told you over and over, the only person who can make a decision in your case is the DWP. You are already convinced that they will say no, so what is the harm in writing to them, laying out your situation and asking.

Ultimately this is what you have to do, yes, I am fully aware that it is a scary prospect, but there is no other option.

In my situation I thought for years and years that there was no way I would be able to receive IR benefits as I owned a house I didn't live in. I was wrong, and I could have changed my life much earlier if I'd asked properly about my own specific situation.

If you are really genuine in what you have told us on the forum you will take this advice and see what happens.

If you continue to bleat about Deprivation of Capital and how you aren't allowed to do whatever without actually having asked the DWP about your personal situation, then I will have to assume that you are just trolling for attention.

Seriously, take the advice, it may or may not work in your case, but it is absolutely the only thing you can try right now, without actually selling up and moving to a more affordable property.

jlawrence

GirlFromMars wrote: »

Yes, the DWP knew I wasn't claiming IR benefits, but that I would be after buying the property. As it turned out in my situation I didn't realise the property would already have been disregarded as a result of my disabled brother living there, so due to an appeal that I'd just won I was able to claim IR benefits backdated for the previous year.

I would have been unable to buy a property if they didn't disregard the capital, and they knew this, and they knew I was aware of Deprivation of Capital by the point that I wrote to them.



Ultimately your primary focus isn't to have an income, it's to keep your property in six years time. You could very easily live off your capital until it is gone, but you would have to move when your mortgage becomes due.

The £100K personal injury payment would have been disregarded if you had put it into a trust during the first year after you received it, and would probably have been disregarded if you used it to buy your house instead of getting caught up in a totally irrational mortgage situation.

I have told you over and over, the only person who can make a decision in your case is the DWP. You are already convinced that they will say no, so what is the harm in writing to them, laying out your situation and asking.

Ultimately this is what you have to do, yes, I am fully aware that it is a scary prospect, but there is no other option.

In my situation I thought for years and years that there was no way I would be able to receive IR benefits as I owned a house I didn't live in. I was wrong, and I could have changed my life much earlier if I'd asked properly about my own specific situation.

If you are really genuine in what you have told us on the forum you will take this advice and see what happens.

If you continue to bleat about Deprivation of Capital and how you aren't allowed to do whatever without actually having asked the DWP about your personal situation, then I will have to assume that you are just trolling for attention.

Seriously, take the advice, it may or may not work in your case, but it is absolutely the only thing you can try right now, without actually selling up and moving to a more affordable property.

Hi & thank you. Yes it is very scary, I don't like getting involved with the DWP and benefits having in the past spent time in prison over a benefit fraud that never was - the DWP had calculated the figures incorrectly. They later accepted that there never was an illegal act, but since I pleaded guilty assuming that the DWP had it right in the first place, I had to serve a term of imprisonment.
Yes I will write a letter to the DWP this afternoon and see what happens. I do however disagree that my prime concern is not being paid, but losing our home between now and 2020. As I think that they would see it, we need money like now from the benefit system. They know full well that we can support ourselves for the next 6 years on the capital. They will also know that we do have equity in the property and could move and buy elsewhere in 2020.
Still I will do as you suggest and if you don't mind, can I post the draft letter on here and ask if you think that it is OK?
TomTom's post is quite positive in that whatever we do will be like p*****g in the wind as far as the DWP are concerned.

pmlindyloo

jlawrence wrote: »

Hi & thank you. Yes it is very scary, I don't like getting involved with the DWP and benefits having in the past spent time in prison over a benefit fraud that never was - the DWP had calculated the figures incorrectly. They later accepted that there never was an illegal act, but since I pleaded guilty assuming that the DWP had it right in the first place, I had to serve a term of imprisonment.
Yes I will write a letter to the DWP this afternoon and see what happens. I do however disagree that my prime concern is not being paid, but losing our home between now and 2020. As I think that they would see it, we need money like now from the benefit system. They know full well that we can support ourselves for the next 6 years on the capital. They will also know that we do have equity in the property and could move and buy elsewhere in 2020.
Still I will do as you suggest and if you don't mind, can I post the draft letter on here and ask if you think that it is OK?
TomTom's post is quite positive in that whatever we do will be like p*****g in the wind as far as the DWP are concerned.

GirlFromMars.

This poster is very contradictory in his posts.

Despite telling you that he was imprisoned for benefit fraud a previous post says that he has never claimed benefits before.

QUOTE
My name is not Andy as I have pointed out so many times. The only benefit that I have ever claimed was ESA recently, given that we had almost used up all of our savings and needed an income. You know full well what the situation is with the £100,000 - it is held in a deposit account by the bank as security for the repayment in 2020 of the £100,000 interest only mortgage we have on our new home. The DWP in their wisdom have told me that I cannot claim ESA as we have substantial savings and should start spending the £100.000 to live off and worry about the ability to pay the mortgage off when the time comes.

Many long serving members on MSE consider him to be a troll. He certainly seems to offer very little advice of his own other than 'dissing' the system

Obviously it is entirely up to you whether you continue to help out but having done considerable research for him/her myself and my advice totally ignored, you may wish to consider whether you wish to spend any of your time giving him/her further advice/help.