UC/ESA & Permitted Work?

At the present time my client lives with her 13 year old daughter.

My client is currently in receipt of IR-ESA to include the Support Component. She receives HB/CTS. She gets CB. She gets DLA higher rate care & mobility. We have told the client that she will be entitled to a SDP as part of her ESA applicable amount based on the facts.

She has just started some work (7 hrs 20 mins) each week and earns approx. £70.00 per week. The DWP have been notified and we have asked them to treat the work as Permitted Work. The work started on 6 May 2016.

She made a claim for CTC – HMRC state this was received on 28 April 2016 – and a decision was made 8 May 2016 that she does not qualify and that she should claim UC instead.

She had previously been in receipt of CTC as a member of couple but following a relationship breakdown had to make a new claim as a single claimant.

There does not, as I understand it, appear to be any provision in UC for earned income to be treated the same way as Permitted Work is for IR-ESA. So she might be immediately worse off if she claims UC? I am not making any allowances for any potential CTC award.

Does anyone know if there is any such protection, provision or transitional protection in UC for work as there is in ESA?

We will do some calculations to work out how much she would receive on UC as opposed to her current benefits which exclude CTC for the time being.

This is my first direct UC experience so apologies if I am missing something or not asking the right questions.

Your advice would be gratefully appreciated.

I think your client has been given the wrong information by HMRC.  She is on ESA so is not entitled to UC.  She should be able to get CTC.  She should be encouraged to challenge the HMRC decision.  There is a UC helpline she could contact: 0345 600 0723 .

Yes, I can’t see how she could get through the gateway unless you’re in a fully digital area?

I cover the Greater London area - so that is a large geographical area - but the post code for this client is CR0 and I think this might be a fully digital area. I will check but if it is does that mean if she wants CTC she will have to make a UC claim?

Anyone have any advice on the Permitted Work issue?

CR0 is in the digital area – you can check on https://www.gov.uk/apply-universal-credit

I suppose it is a UC claim, as it is a new claim under a change of circumstances.  But take a look here for discussion: http://www.rightsnet.org.uk/forums/viewthread/9329/

The ‘permitted work’ issue of UC is, to my mind, most confusing.

There is no PW as such in Universal Credit but you can work when you have limited capability for work and not lose the LCW as long as you don’t earn more £499.20 monthly. You lose LCW automatically if you go over this limit.

See P994 of current CPAG book, from which the following is stolen:

‘However you can work and earn above this threshold without automatically being treated as not having LCW if you are:

Entitled to AA, DLA, or PIP, or you have already been assessed as having LCW (though the DWP may still reassess you)

Or – you are automatically treated as having LCW because of a specific circumstance or you are treated as having limited capability for work-related activity.

I think this is the relevant UC Reg -  http://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2013/376/regulation/41/made

I think these new provisions are horribly unclear. New, simpler benefit system?  BAH.

Hi Andrew,

Thanks for your reply. I will take a look at the various bits and take it from there.

I suspect I might be coming back to this thread sooner rather than later.

As UC would include housing costs, it seems the lower £192pcm work allowance would apply (CPAG p154). So she would lose a bit of UC due to the taper. But the real pitfall is that while a UC claim would include a child element, it has no equivalent to the SDP. So, she may end up on roughly the same overall income as if she just stayed on ESA with no CTC.

Anyway, the calculations should be worth examining.

The original justification was that the higher work allowances for people with disabilities would have a similar effect to the permitted work rules in current benefits.  Those allowances have now been severely reduced so that argument no longer holds water.

It appears to be a new claim for Tax Credits, no change of circumstances for ESA is mentioned so surely ESA stands, with the usual PW rules?

ib - 19 May 2016 11:57 AM

It appears to be a new claim for Tax Credits, no change of circumstances for ESA is mentioned so surely ESA stands, with the usual PW rules?

There can be no new claims for tax credits in a digital area. So, it’s either stay as you are, or claim UC (or ... move out of the area ...?)

[ edit: hmm, would this be different if the client had been on c-ESA .. would the old PW rules then still apply, even with a UC top-up?? ]

[would this be different if the client had been on c-ESA .. would the old PW rules then still apply, even with a UC top-up?]

As far as I can see, we’ll have the cumbersome outcome of the claimant having to adhere to both CESA permitted work and UC whatever-they’re calling-it rules.