Disability benefits

Shaws86

Hi, 
Sorry for the long thread. 
I am after some advice, I am a single parent to 3 child, my son whom is 19 has kidney failure and is disabled. I care for him more than 35 hours (he does get pip). However I am a full time student myself and have had an ongoing dispute with universal credit in regards to what I can claim, I originally had the child disability element on my claim, I was then falsely informed I could get Cares allowance, which resulted in a back payment and deducting in my claim. They have since removed all elements from my claim. What im trying to get at is there anything as a full time student I can claim for caring for my son? He is 19 and a student himself so he does get PIP and DSA and his own student finance. 

KxMx

Disabled students and UC is a complex area, I'd recommend contacting Disability Rights UK who have a disabled students helpline.

https://www.disabilityrightsuk.org/disabled-students-helpline

Spoonie_Turtle

Shaws86 said:

Hi, 
Sorry for the long thread. 
I am after some advice, I am a single parent to 3 child, my son whom is 19 has kidney failure and is disabled. I care for him more than 35 hours (he does get pip). However I am a full time student myself and have had an ongoing dispute with universal credit in regards to what I can claim, I originally had the child disability element on my claim, I was then falsely informed I could get Cares allowance, which resulted in a back payment and deducting in my claim. They have since removed all elements from my claim. What im trying to get at is there anything as a full time student I can claim for caring for my son? He is 19 and a student himself so he does get PIP and DSA and his own student finance. 

Full time students can only claim UC if they are disabled themselves or have a dependant child - the latter presumably is how you were able to claim UC.  But you should have had any student finance taken into account.

You will have had the disabled child element and standard child element until he no longer counted as a dependant child.  The carer element should normally remain, but as above if he is no longer a dependant child then you are not eligible to claim UC as a full-time student.

https://www.gov.uk/guidance/universal-credit-and-students

I don't know of any conflict between being a full-time student and claiming Carers Allowance, but others here are more conversant with CA rules than I am.  Edit: I was wrong, see following comment.

teaselMay

The criteria for carers allowance include: 

• you’re not in full-time education
• you’re not studying for 21 hours a week or more