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Housing benefit - temporary accommodation - benefit cap
I am trying to calculate HB benefit cap for a claimant who is getting legacy benefits.
I’m trying to figure out if the temporary accommodation rent should be deemed to be nil - as set out in HB Regs 2006 75C
HB Regs 75H sets out the types of accommodation this applies to as
- exempt accommodation
- supported accommodation
- DV hostels
and
- Hostels where claimant receives care, support or supervision.
I guess what I am unclear on is whether a majority of temporary accommodation can be considered to be either exempt accommodation, or hostels where the claimant receives care, support or supervision.
Or is this actually something that has to be looked at on a case by case basis depending on the exact support needs of each claimants?
There is some overlap between TA and specified/exempt, especially when the TA is provided by a registered HA as opposed to the LA directly.
An LA can only provide two kinds of specified accommodation: a DV refuge and a supported hostel. Bog standard leased TA in a conventional street property will be neither of those. It is arguable that a B&B satisfies the definition of “hostel”, but there is also the support requirement.
If the TA is provided by a registered housing association, the overlap with specified accommodation is larger: all it requires is that the claimant receives support irrespective of the building type.
Watch out for the Council (who will be making the ben cap decision) saying that TA “trumps” all the spec acc categories apart from exempt accommodation. That is only true for subsidy and statistical purposes, as far as benefit entitlement is concerned it can be both TA and any category of spec acc at the same time.