Care home costs, thresholds, and joint accounts

nezpottage · 21 December 2021 at 1:58PM

Hi all. Hopefully this is the right place to post, and that I can get some advice.

So my mother has recently been moved to a care home after her dementia has meant we are struggling to care for her at home. At the moment the local authority is sorting out the fees for that, as my mum finances are under the min threshold.

My question related to the joint account she has with my Father. So long story short, my mum hasn't worked for maybe 40 years, and all my Dad's income went into a joint account they had for income in, and bills out. Since retirement for the both of them, Mum's pension has been getting paid into a single account in her name, but my Dad's pension has been getting paid into the joint account. With savings etc over time, there is a decent amount in there.

The local authority have done the financial checks, and say that as it's a joint account, they class 50% of any money on there as my Mum's, and as such, with her now being in the care home, any extra fee's etc CANNOT be taken out of her money, either in her single account or the joint account.

In truth, that means that nearly 100% of the money in the joint account has been put there by my Dad, but now he can only spend / move half of it, as i understand.

Does this sound as though I have the right end of the stick on this, and is there anything at all that my Dad can do with any of 'his wife's money' from the joint account?

We are going to sort him a single account in his name, and in theory move his pension payments to that account, and maybe move "his" half of the money over to it, but I wanted some advice on if we can do that, and if there are options with the other half of the savings?

Thanks in advance

[Deleted User] · 12 January 2022 at 2:33PM

I believe that when it comes to bank accounts /savings - the fact that one of a couple has a separate account - makes no difference in law
The combined assets are what counts with benefits.

Savvy_Sue · 13 January 2022 at 12:04AM

I'm not sure you're right about that. However they can ask for statements going back rather than just the current situation, and if it's clear that money was moved from one account to another just before assessment, questions will be asked.