Effect of low passive income on ESA/ HB

thinkstoomuch

I'm thinking aloud here- please indulge me

I'm on ESA support group for chronic depression. I volunteer for 6 hours a week which zonks me for days after so I'm not in a position to work employed or even self employed yet even part time. However, dangerously, I've had an idea.

I want to write and self-publish an e-book (or rather a linked series of 4) on a subject related to my now very aged degree. My dream would be to save enough to retrain in something in a couple of years. Realistically, if I made £50 I think I'd have done okay.

I know about the weekly earning and savings limits for ESA and that above that it either tapers or gets cut off entirely. Fair enough. But I've got a couple of questions I'm hoping you might be able to answer:

1. How does income extra to ESA affect HB? If you earned the £130 a week on top of ESA, does any of that income affect your HB and CTR?

2.What happens if the amount fluctuates above and below the earnings limit on a weekly basis e.g. £60 one week, £200 another week?

3. How much would you need to be bringing in before you need to do an HMRC self-employed tax return?

As I say, it's just an idea. I may very well run out of puff long before I get as far as publishing but I don't want to get into any unforseen trouble if the miraculous happened. Any help you can provide would be brilliant. Thanks in advance.

poppy12345

You can do permitted work while claiming ESA providing you don't earn anymore than £131.50 per week after deductions and work less than 16 hours per week.



There's no averaging hours and any week you earn over than amount then you won't be entitled to ESA for that week.



Earnings from permitted work are disregarded for other means tested benefits.


You must get permission from DWP before starting the work.


https://www.entitledto.co.uk/help/Permitted-Work-Rules

Afraid_of_Kittens

Income from an ebook will be classed as self employed inome for benefit purposes. A years income and expenditure will be used and divided by 52 to get a average weekly income. Prior to a years trading they will take projected income for 3 months and then use actual income every 13 weeks after that until they have a years tradng figures.