Mentally/Physically Ill person and Home Care charges
Bobbles2_2
Posts: 2 Newbie
Hi,
I would be grateful for some advice regarding my father. We have not been in contact with each other for some 15 years but in sad circumstances, we have regained this contact. He has a long list of medical conditions which have rendered him completely immobile and unable to stand, and he now needs to go into a nursing home (his physical state has been in steady decline for a long time). For many years, he has also suffered with paranoid delusions, and he also has a degree of cognitive impairment (he has been receiving support from a Community Psychiatric Nurse for his mental health problems). He has now been assessed as not having mental capacity to look after his financial affairs and I am in the process of going to the Court of Protection to be his deputy.
Dad has been living in sheltered housing until now and the social services say that he owes £9,000 plus for home care fees that he has not paid. Clearly, I will not have the full facts of his finances until I get the Court of Protection consent to be deputy, but I suspect that he had below the lower threshold level and that he should have been entitled to free home care help from social services. Certainly, I have seen his bank account statement from July of this year and he was below the threshold. He does not have any other assets such as property etc. I expect that he should have told Social Services this, but for whatever reason, he has not. This is likely to be due to his mental state. He has been rather paranoid - apparently thinking that people have been stealing his money/possessions, so may not have given bank details for this reason. Alternatively, due to his cognitive impairment, he may not have realised that he was entitled to free home care.
It is rather distressing to find a letter in his paperwork in his flat (I am busy clearing it) in which he discusses not being able to afford to pay for the home care service and he was worried about this. The letter states that he was going to try to manage this by asking for reduced hours home care. He had decided that he could live and sleep in his recliner chair but he was worried about how he would manage to get food or make a meal. This seems to have been a rather tragic misunderstanding.
Once I get the Court of Protection permission to be his deputy, I can look into his finances further. If I am able to prove (by supplying them with bank statements) that he was below the lower threshold - given the circumstances, do you think that they will be sympathetic and be able to review this retrospectively. I am afraid that if they insist on payment, this will bankrupt him. Logic tells me that they should review this, but I know that sometimes logic and the law don't coincide. I would be grateful for advice on this matter.
Thank you.
I would be grateful for some advice regarding my father. We have not been in contact with each other for some 15 years but in sad circumstances, we have regained this contact. He has a long list of medical conditions which have rendered him completely immobile and unable to stand, and he now needs to go into a nursing home (his physical state has been in steady decline for a long time). For many years, he has also suffered with paranoid delusions, and he also has a degree of cognitive impairment (he has been receiving support from a Community Psychiatric Nurse for his mental health problems). He has now been assessed as not having mental capacity to look after his financial affairs and I am in the process of going to the Court of Protection to be his deputy.
Dad has been living in sheltered housing until now and the social services say that he owes £9,000 plus for home care fees that he has not paid. Clearly, I will not have the full facts of his finances until I get the Court of Protection consent to be deputy, but I suspect that he had below the lower threshold level and that he should have been entitled to free home care help from social services. Certainly, I have seen his bank account statement from July of this year and he was below the threshold. He does not have any other assets such as property etc. I expect that he should have told Social Services this, but for whatever reason, he has not. This is likely to be due to his mental state. He has been rather paranoid - apparently thinking that people have been stealing his money/possessions, so may not have given bank details for this reason. Alternatively, due to his cognitive impairment, he may not have realised that he was entitled to free home care.
It is rather distressing to find a letter in his paperwork in his flat (I am busy clearing it) in which he discusses not being able to afford to pay for the home care service and he was worried about this. The letter states that he was going to try to manage this by asking for reduced hours home care. He had decided that he could live and sleep in his recliner chair but he was worried about how he would manage to get food or make a meal. This seems to have been a rather tragic misunderstanding.
Once I get the Court of Protection permission to be his deputy, I can look into his finances further. If I am able to prove (by supplying them with bank statements) that he was below the lower threshold - given the circumstances, do you think that they will be sympathetic and be able to review this retrospectively. I am afraid that if they insist on payment, this will bankrupt him. Logic tells me that they should review this, but I know that sometimes logic and the law don't coincide. I would be grateful for advice on this matter.
Thank you.
0
Comments
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Hi,
I would be grateful for some advice regarding my father. We have not been in contact with each other for some 15 years but in sad circumstances, we have regained this contact. He has a long list of medical conditions which have rendered him completely immobile and unable to stand, and he now needs to go into a nursing home (his physical state has been in steady decline for a long time). For many years, he has also suffered with paranoid delusions, and he also has a degree of cognitive impairment (he has been receiving support from a Community Psychiatric Nurse for his mental health problems). He has now been assessed as not having mental capacity to look after his financial affairs and I am in the process of going to the Court of Protection to be his deputy.
Dad has been living in sheltered housing until now and the social services say that he owes £9,000 plus for home care fees that he has not paid. Clearly, I will not have the full facts of his finances until I get the Court of Protection consent to be deputy, but I suspect that he had below the lower threshold level and that he should have been entitled to free home care help from social services. Certainly, I have seen his bank account statement from July of this year and he was below the threshold. He does not have any other assets such as property etc. I expect that he should have told Social Services this, but for whatever reason, he has not. This is likely to be due to his mental state. He has been rather paranoid - apparently thinking that people have been stealing his money/possessions, so may not have given bank details for this reason. Alternatively, due to his cognitive impairment, he may not have realised that he was entitled to free home care.
It is rather distressing to find a letter in his paperwork in his flat (I am busy clearing it) in which he discusses not being able to afford to pay for the home care service and he was worried about this. The letter states that he was going to try to manage this by asking for reduced hours home care. He had decided that he could live and sleep in his recliner chair but he was worried about how he would manage to get food or make a meal. This seems to have been a rather tragic misunderstanding.
Once I get the Court of Protection permission to be his deputy, I can look into his finances further. If I am able to prove (by supplying them with bank statements) that he was below the lower threshold - given the circumstances, do you think that they will be sympathetic and be able to review this retrospectively. I am afraid that if they insist on payment, this will bankrupt him. Logic tells me that they should review this, but I know that sometimes logic and the law don't coincide. I would be grateful for advice on this matter.
Thank you.
Have you spoken to his social worker? If so, what have they got to say about matters?
Then speak with the sheltered housing manager. I suspect there are plans in place how to fund the accrued debt as no manager would simply allow debts to the amount you describe to accrue without the manager (or finance department) having sureties in place that the money will be paid.
You may first need to find out who the sheltered housing have recorded as your father's next of kin or authorised carer as it may only be them that the housing manager will discuss (and probably already has done) such matters with.0 -
Hi Bubbles, thank you for your query regarding care home fees,
Unfortunately on the information you have provided I cannot advise you but I would suggest that when you have all the information you seek advice from a Citizens Advice Bureau. In the meantime I would suggest you write to the care home and ask them to hold action on the account until you have the details of his financial affairs. You can find your local Citizens Advice Bureau at https://www.citizensadvice.org.uk.
Hope this is of assistance.“Official CAB Representative
I am an official representative of CAB. MSE has given permission for me to post in response to questions on the CAB Board. You can see my name on the companies with permission to post list. If you believe I’ve broken any rules please report my post to forumteam@moneysavingexpert.com as usual"0 -
Thank you for your replies. As far as I can ascertain, Dad has been receiving housing benefit which has been paid to the sheltered housing company, so it seems that his rent has been taken care of and I'm not worried about that.
My query relates not to care home fees but to a home care service organised by social services (i.e. someone going in to help him dress/wash/feed etc). As far as I can gather, you have to pay the full cost of care in the home unless you can declare that you have less than around £22,000 ish. Below that, there is a shared cost basis unless you have below £14,250 in savings/assets when the council will pick up the cost in full.
It seems that he was below the lower threshold, but for whatever reason, due to his mental health condition (paranoid delusions and cognitive impairment), he hadn't understood the rules and/or did not/could not fill in the necessary paperwork to declare his financial status. Clearly, the onus is usually on the person receiving the care to ensure that he/she claims the benefits to which he/she is entitled. Indeed, it appears that someone has helped him to claim housing benefit, but the issue of helping him claim assistance with his home care fees was not addressed.
If I can get the COP permission to be his deputy, I can declare his financial status and obtain copy bank statements to provide to Social Services to prove that he was entitled to assistance with these fees from them. I am just a little worried that they will say that they won't review this retrospectively but say that it was up to him to make that declaration at the time. The trouble is, when someone is mentally ill, they can't always understand and do this. Sadly, due to unfortunate circumstances, Dad parted company with the rest of the family many years ago, and moved away from the area - so he has had no friends/family to assist him over the past few years. His only support has been from his social worker, GP and community psychiatric nurse. I've even found a letter from Help the Aged written to dad, in response to kind concerns raised by his 85 year old neighbour about his physical disabilities and the fact that she thought he needed more help. Because this neighbour was not a family member, all they could do was write and ask dad to contact them if he felt he needed help from them. I doubt that he did this.
Social services have now had dad formally assessed as mentally incapable of looking after his finances, but it seems clear to me that he has been mentally incapable of this for some time. It is all such a sorry state of affairs0
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