ESA and Carers Allowance

D.va

Hello everyone! I am caring for my mother at the moment, but I do not claim Carers Allowance. However, I now would like to start claiming CA, for reasons concerning my new husband's visa. I won't bore anyone with visa stuff - just know that I am needing to get full CA, not just the Carer's Premium.

Right now I get ESA; I'm in the support group (about £125 per week). I earn too much to get full Carer's Allowance, and I would just have an 'underlying eligibility.' So my question basically is, what is the best way for me to go about getting full Carers Allowance? The options I have looked into are:

(1) Claiming ESA in the WRAG group if possible (meaning I would earn less than £116 per week) and claiming CA on top of that. I did a benefits calculator, and it said I could get £74.40 weekly for ESA WRAG, and £62.70 for CA. Since these benefits added together pushes me over the £116 weekly amount, would I not get full CA by doing this?

(2) Ditching ESA completely and claiming CA and Income Support. Would I get full CA by doing this?

If anyone has any ideas or any thoughts to share in general, I'd be very grateful.

poppy12345

D.va wrote: »

Hello everyone! I am caring for my mother at the moment, but I do not claim Carers Allowance. However, I now would like to start claiming CA, for reasons concerning my new husband's visa. I won't bore anyone with visa stuff - just know that I am needing to get full CA, not just the Carer's Premium.

Right now I get ESA; I'm in the support group (about £125 per week). I earn too much to get full Carer's Allowance, and I would just have an 'underlying eligibility.' So my question basically is, what is the best way for me to go about getting full Carers Allowance? The options I have looked into are:

(1) Claiming ESA in the WRAG group if possible (meaning I would earn less than £116 per week) and claiming CA on top of that. I did a benefits calculator, and it said I could get £74.40 weekly for ESA WRAG, and £62.70 for CA. Since these benefits added together pushes me over the £116 weekly amount, would I not get full CA by doing this?

(2) Ditching ESA completely and claiming CA and Income Support. Would I get full CA by doing this?

If anyone has any ideas or any thoughts to share in general, I'd be very grateful.

Firstly, does your mother claim Mid/high rate care DLA or Daily living PIP and do you look after her for at least 35 hours per week? if not then you won't be able to claim CA.

If it's yes then because you don't earn anything, you claim Support Group ESA then you'll have an underlying entitlement to it and get the Carers Premium. There's certain benefits that can't be claimed to gether and ESA and IS are 2 of them.

D.va

poppy12345 wrote: »

Firstly, does your mother claim Mid/high rate care DLA or Daily living PIP and do you look after her for at least 35 hours per week? if not then you won't be able to claim CA.

If it's yes then because you don't earn anything, you claim Support Group ESA then you'll have an underlying entitlement to it and get the Carers Premium. There's certain benefits that can't be claimed to gether and ESA and IS are 2 of them.

Yes and yes; I've made sure that I am fully eligible for CA.

Thanks for replying! But I don't quite understand what you're saying in the second part of your post. I don't want to claim ESA and IS together; I am looking to just claim one of them along with CA. However, I need to know if I will be able to get full CA (i.e. not Carers Premium) while getting either one of these benefits. I know I can't get CA while I'm in the support group.

Sorry if I was unclear in my post, but my basic question is, can I get ESA (wrag) and get full CA? If not, then could I get IS and full CA?

poppy12345

D.va wrote: »

Yes and yes; I've made sure that I am fully eligible for CA.

Thanks for replying! But I don't quite understand what you're saying in the second part of your post. I don't want to claim ESA and IS together; I am looking to just claim one of them along with CA. However, I need to know if I will be able to get full CA (i.e. not Carers Premium) while getting either one of these benefits. I know I can't get CA while I'm in the support group.

Sorry if I was unclear in my post, but my basic question is, can I get ESA (wrag) and get full CA? If not, then could I get IS and full CA?

Your question was perfectly clear. You can NOT claim any ESA and CA together, you'll get the Carer premium instead. You also asked about Income Support and Carers Allowance, the same goes for that also, you can't claim them both together. What's your reason for wanting to claim the full CA only?

[Deleted User]

poppy12345 wrote: »

Your question was perfectly clear. You can NOT claim any ESA and CA together, you'll get the Carer premium instead. You also asked about Income Support and Carers Allowance, the same goes for that also, you can't claim them both together. What's your reason for wanting to claim the full CA only?

Because those claiming carers allowance don’t need to meet the minimum income when applying for a visa for a foreign spouse I’m assuming

D.va

poppy12345 wrote: »

Your question was perfectly clear. You can NOT claim any ESA and CA together, you'll get the Carer premium instead. You also asked about Income Support and Carers Allowance, the same goes for that also, you can't claim them both together. What's your reason for wanting to claim the full CA only?

Oh that's disappointing, I had read in several places that you can get CA and IS together.

My reason for needing full CA is that it would help a lot in being able to bring my new husband to the UK sooner. But Carers Premium doesn't count concerning the visa; it has to be actual CA. Is there anything at all I can do to top up my income on CA without having to switch to Carers Premium?

poppy12345

Having checked CA and IS it seems like you can claim them together. You would get £62.70 CA and £45.35 IS but you won't be able to claim IS until your application for CA has been accepted. The backlog for CA is huge and could possibly be 10 weeks or more. If you claim CA it could affect some benefits your mum gets. If she gets Severe Disability Premium, then she'll no longer be entitled to that.

TELLIT01

There seems to be some confusion about claiming either ESA or IS and CA at the same time. You can claim both but CA will be taken fully into account against either ESA or CA (the amount of CA will be deducted from ESA or CA) and then the carer premium will be added.
What you cannot do is receive the CA payment in full AND ESA or IS in full together.
The Carers Premium won't be paid on ESA or IS unless the claimant has claimed Carers Allowance.

D.va

poppy12345 wrote: »

Having checked CA and IS it seems like you can claim them together. You would get £62.70 CA and £45.35 IS but you won't be able to claim IS until your application for CA has been accepted. The backlog for CA is huge and could possibly be 10 weeks or more. If you claim CA it could affect some benefits your mum gets. If she gets Severe Disability Premium, then she'll no longer be entitled to that.

Oh thank you, that's good news! That's a long backlog but not too bad. Mum isn't too concerned, as long as it means that my husband is the one moving country and not me!

D.va

TELLIT01 wrote: »

There seems to be some confusion about claiming either ESA or IS and CA at the same time. You can claim both but CA will be taken fully into account against either ESA or CA (the amount of CA will be deducted from ESA or CA) and then the carer premium will be added.
What you cannot do is receive the CA payment in full AND ESA or IS in full together.
The Carers Premium won't be paid on ESA or IS unless the claimant has claimed Carers Allowance.

Ah, interesting.. So, if I can ask: if I was to claim CA and then IS afterwards, would my CA become the carers premium? That's what I'm hopefully trying to avoid

poppy12345

TELLIT01 wrote: »

There seems to be some confusion about claiming either ESA or IS and CA at the same time. You can claim both but CA will be taken fully into account against either ESA or CA (the amount of CA will be deducted from ESA or CA) and then the carer premium will be added.
What you cannot do is receive the CA payment in full AND ESA or IS in full together.
The Carers Premium won't be paid on ESA or IS unless the claimant has claimed Carers Allowance.

That's what i thought at first but then i read it differently for IS and CA. Now i'm confused.