Universal credit

[Pompei36]

Please excuse my lack of knowledge as I never had to claim anything before .
Me and my hb have a small business, we always paid ourselves minimum through PAYE and the rest in dividends, we have no savings.
Now we might be forced to furlough ourselves and will receive around £560 each , if I have to apply for UC what do I put as income? wage+dividends or only the paye wage? is so confusing .Mortgage holiday has been approved for 3 months but the bills are more than 1k a month.
Thank you.

I think you have to declare income ie PAYE and also any other income. If you have savings they are also taken into account. Based on what you've said about your income I wouldn't expect much in the way of UC. Go to one of the online benefits calculators (e.g. turn2us and entitledto) and see what it says.

Sorry. Just seen you have no savings. UC won't go towards your mortgage though.

If you are receiving money through dividends you would need to declare that income somewhere. Earnings through PAYE would be reported to Uc via HMRC but I'm not sure how you declare the dividends- maybe in the section which asks about other income. If unsure just explain on your journal.

I think dividends are counted as 'other income' when you fill out the application form.

Remember that UC takes so much off the amount once your earnings are over a certain threshold too.
Unfortunately you wont be entitled to any help towards housing/mortgage under UC.

Thank you , the mortgage is on hold until August, every other bill is still running as normal. Just went on the calculator and been reminded why I never wanted anything to do with the benefits system.
I’ll find another way of staying afloat for the next couple of months, but many thanks to you all and good luck👍

If you have no children then you would only get a Uc entitlement of £594.04 assuming you are over 25 and your joint earnings would cancel out any entitlement unfortunately.

Sorry I meant to say your earnings alone would result in a zero award even without taking the dividends into consideration.

hi there are a couple of interactive websites where you can fill out your details and see what and how much you're eligible for, they're called entiledto and turn2us. they should tell you about council tax reductions and work it out for you, good luck, it sounds really difficult for you xx

It's worth applying
Even if they don't award you any money
You should get your National Insurance paid which contributes to state pension & other benefits

Just apply via www.gov.uk Under Universal credit

It's not back dated, so apply asap

Presumably if being paid £560 each plus dividends they will be paying NI contributions anyway?