ESA Letter confusing

mustangboy3

My partners ESA letter has Your income related amount is £140.55 so you will be entitled to £140.55 and However because you are entitled to Contribution based ESA we will pay you £140.55, i am sure this means her ESA is contribution Based but would like to confirm this. thank you

KxMx

£140.55 is the 2025/2026 amount for New Style ESA.
NS ESA is 100% Contributions Based. 

Newcad

Yes the ESA here is Contribution Based. The payment shown is what it will be after the April increase.

There is no IR ESA entitlement there or the payment would be higher as it would include at least the Enhanced Disability Premium, AKA Disability Income Gaurantee.
But it may still be Old Style ESA, you can't really tell from those letters.

Think of that line as just having a bit missing at the start and it should be saying:
"If you aren't entitled to CB ESA then your Income Related Amount is ....."

The ESA letters have always been confusing with that 'Income Related Amount' - it's simply because they try to do both IR ESA and CB ESA using the same letter, and they do it cack-handedly which ends up confusing things most of the time.

The wording on the ESA letters will eventually change but that's not going to happen until all (or at least most) IR ESA claimants have been migrated to UC, once that is done there will only be  New Style ESA left so no need to mention 'Income Related' on the letters at all.