Potential Carers Allowance Overpayment

Trinitrotoluene

Hi Everyone,

Our daughter has Cerebral Palsy, and subsequently my partner is in receipt of Carers Allowance. She works 14 hours a week and gets paid £9.20 an hour. She puts somewhere around £30 a week in to her pension, which then takes her below the threshold. She recently cut 2 hours off when her pay went up to ensure she kept within the threshold. She has been in receipt of this since 2013. Her work pays her monthly, and this depends on the number of weeks in that month meaning sometimes she gets 5 weeks of pay and sometimes she gets 4. Carers have queried this numerous times, the last time being 2019 and have taken no action and were happy with it after it was explained.

She had a call today from Carers Allowance saying that she has been over earning and they were going to go back until 2015 and re-calculate how much she owes them. When she told them what she normally says they told her she can't average out like that any more and he is going to ring tomorrow with the calculations of how much she owes. This seems exceptionally unfair to me (though there may be a single month where she WAS overpaid because work paid her a bonus and despite her putting more money in to her pension to compensate she didn't quite hit under the threshold). They also asked her about child care expenses from back in 2015 and they asked her if she had invoices from back then.

My questions:
- Is there scope for them to be sensible about averaging these payments out? Is there anywhere I can reference if they claim there isn't?
- As Carers have been in contact numerous times and have agreed and not taken action in the past, can they now change their mind and go back to 2015, even though in 2019 they were happy after having checked and verified her income?
- If they come back with the one month needing to be overpaid, then we'd just pay that back. What is the best option to take if they come back with a ridiculous amount of money owed? I suspect based on how my partner explained this to me he is going to calculate every "month" that was over paid instead of looking at the average.
- What do we need to ask for if we're not happy and want it escalated and rechecked. Is this within our right?

Any help or advice would be appreciated.

Alice_Holt

This seems rather unreasonable to me.

Regulations provide that monthly earnings are worked out on a weekly basis. If the employer confirms the number (and dates) of weeks covered in each monthly payroll, then the earlier CA interpretation of weekly income (per 2019) seems correct. 
Can you draw up a schedule to show this, and that bar one week / month - you were under the earnings limit for that period.

If CA persist then you need to challenge a decision that a large sum of CA is repayable.  This is through a mandatory reconsideration and then an appeal to a tribunal. 
 
  https://www.gov.uk/mandatory-reconsideration

https://www.ageuk.org.uk/information-advice/money-legal/benefits-entitlements/how-to-challenge-a-benefit-decision/

https://www.disabilityrightsuk.org/appeals-and-mandatory-reconsiderations


You may wish to ask for a SAR to get information on previous CA decisions from the DWP (if you don't have documentary evidence already).
https://www.gov.uk/guidance/request-your-personal-information-from-the-department-for-work-and-pensions

 If it gets to MR / appeal stage - see if your local advice charity has the capacity to help you with this.
https://www.citizensadvice.org.uk/about-us/contact-us/contact-us/contact-us/

Another source of help, if you think CA are being unreasonable, could be your MP.

Here is a report by a parliamentary committee (but not taken up by the DWP):
https://publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm201719/cmselect/cmworpen/1772/177207.htm

Paras 53-58 may be useful as background info.



Re: "They also asked her about child care expenses from back in 2015 and they asked her if she had invoices from back then."

   Certain childcare costs can be deducted from earnings (but not those paid to a close relative). How did you pay? Would bank statements show this?  It may be worth going back to the provider to see if they can give you any documentation.

calcotti

The guidance is clear that if earnings fluctuate they can be averaged ( indeed, should be averaged).
https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/893673/dmgch15.pdf
Paragraph 15452 onwards.

Robbie64

Just to check: are her wages a constant in that some months they will be a constant 5 times her weekly wage and other months 4 times her weekly wage (for example some care homes pay staff in this manner) with no fluctuation, for example for overtime? If so, it is easy (and should have been all along) for CA to work out a weekly equivalent.

Alice_Holt

Robbie64 said:

Just to check: are her wages a constant in that some months they will be a constant 5 times her weekly wage and other months 4 times her weekly wage (for example some care homes pay staff in this manner) with no fluctuation, for example for overtime? If so, it is easy (and should have been all along) for CA to work out a weekly equivalent.

        Sadly, I suspect we won't get an answer, as the OP's profile suggests he hasn't returned to the thread to look at any of the replies:


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oh_really

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Alice_Holt

oh_really said:

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      No,  but in a thread where forumites have sought clarification from the OP - I do tend to feel that it helps if the OP does engage with their thread and reply to helpful forumites. OP's are likely to get better information by doing so.

     Unless there is a technical reason for abandoning the thread (password issues, etc), there is also a risk that posting and ghosting could be seen as discourteous.