Severe Disability Premium?

Hi Gordon, hope you are keeping well. My niece has a conundrum regarding Severe Disability Premium.

She gets Income Support as a lone parent. She also receives PIP daily living.

She was getting the SDP paid with her Income Support until November last year, the same time her daughter turned 19. Her SDP was then stopped without any "understandable" explanation apparently.

However, her daughter was and still is in full time non-advanced education and my niece still receives Child Benefit for her, and still will until August this year.

Therefore, for Income Support and SDP purposes, shouldn't my niece's daughter still be regarded as a dependent and NOT a non-dependent - therefore meaning that my niece technically should still be regarded as living "alone"?

As an aside, because the daughter is still in education, she cannot claim Carer's Allowance.

I believe the DWP may have stopped the SDP by mistake, possibly not realising that the young person is still a dependent and in qualifying for Child Benefit?

I have done several calculations on different benefit calculators, with varying results, but mostly indicating that SDP should be still in payment for current circumstances.

Surely, Severe Disability premium cannot be this complicated. Do you have any advice? Thanks in advance.

Buster

Hi Gordon, I'll make sure she does as advised. Thank you very much for looking in to this.

I had a peek at the Income Support regs as well before posting on the forum (could have been an out of date version). I found something about the Income Support regulations referring to the "Social Security and Contributions benefits Act" for defining dependents and none-dependents - which does indeed suggest age 19 is the cut-off regardless of the young person being in education and having Child Benefit paid for them.

It seems crazy that there appears to be different versions of dependents and non-dependents for different benefits. For example, Child Tax Credits allows up to the age of 20 if the young person is still in education and Child Benefit is being paid. I believe this is similar to the way local authorities treat non-dependents for Housing Benefit deductions (up to age 20).

It's a little bewildering that we have this situation and it seems unfair to stop a person's SDP whilst her dependent young person (daughter) is still unable to claim Carer's Allowance due to being in education.

Anyway, once again Gordon - thank you for your help in this matter.

Buster

Hi Gordon,
just to update this in case anybody else ends up in the same situation.

After ringing the DWP (my niece) and apparently speaking to someone who actually understood the SDP eligibility criteria, my niece has just been awarded back pay of the SDP going back several months as it should not have been stopped in the first place, according to the phone operative.

Apparently, the important bit was, she was ALREADY in receipt of Child Benefit - getting CB for her daughter, at the time of her daughter turning 19.

An error by the DWP which once queried was rectified. However, only after she (my niece) became aware of a possible error by simply having a casual conversation with myself at a family gathering.

So, no need for the MR in the end. Many thanks for your help - giving ordinary people the confidence to challenge decisions.

Buster