Child Element of UC with no Child Benefit

[Theowlandthepussycat22]

Hello, sorry if I waffle on but want to give all the relevant information.

My daughter is 17 and has a tutor at home for a couple of hours a week (which sometimes she can't cope with due to low mood), provided through her EHCP. She is working towards Functional Skills in Maths and English.

She has autism and anxiety making it difficult for her to leave the house. She gets PIP.
She couldn't cope in mainstream secondary which led to her diagnosis and CAMHS involvement.

I have recently had to move over to Universal Credit. I receive Carer’s Allowance which gets detucted off Universal credit payment but I claim for the NI contribution. I am a single parent.

Because my daughter can't do at least 12 hours a week in education we are not entitled to Child Benefit (which I am querying with them).

Can I still get the Child Element of Universal Credit without Child Benefit?

At the moment I get Standard
allowance for myself, Housing and Carer’s Element.

I am also deducted money due to an overpayment when I received backdated Carer’s Allowance.

I'm pretty sure there is some sort of special consideration for home schooling and you should be able to get child element.

Thank you for replying.

Yes, that's what I'd hope for.

I have asked on the UC journal because I just get a Single Person Allowance, but I won't get a response until next week and all the searches online have not applied to my situation.

For child benefit post 16 when electively home educating home education needs to have begun prior to 16 or the student have an EHCP. However, as DD is not being EHE and the LA are providing the education via EOTAS that is irrelevant as DD is not being home educates in that sense.

The sticking point is not being in full time education. But does DD not receive any other provision in section F? She should, it doesn’t have to be formal educational provision such as tutoring it could be therapies, alternative provision, informal/indirect education. If she doesn’t the EHCP isn’t good enough and you should focus on improving it. Provision that only amounts to a couple of hours a week in section F is inadequate.

If DD is judged not to qualify for child benefit it is also likely she won’t be judged as being a qualifying young person for UC and therefore unlikely to be the child element.

The rules on young people in education claiming UC changed last year but if DD isn’t in full time education and you cannot claim CB she may be able to claim it in her own right. If you go down this route get in touch with Contact.

Thank you for replying.

We have looked into other activities such as animal therapy but she finds them overwhelming, and she struggles to engage with any suggestions. Her moods are unpredictable.

Leaving the home or meeting new people in the home are huge triggers. It took a long time for her to be in the same room as her tutor.

Getting the EHCP was a struggle.

Other teens heighten her anxiety due to their unpredictable actions/comments and her bad past experiences.

I had hoped that things would have progressed by now but the delay in accessing CAMHS etc and all the hoops we had to jump through, getting the correct professionals to say the correct magic phrases to the right people etc early on made her more 'broken' than if intervention/help had been accessible much sooner.

But I know we're not alone in all this and other families have it much worse.

She should in her own rights be able to claim UC for herself as she gets PIP.

She can claim benefits in her own right, if she has pip that is a gateway benefit, my dd used to get esa

I didn't know that, thank you.

The rules on this have changed recently though I think?

They have, Contact’s page on this is good. As is their leaflet. But if OP’s DD isn’t classed as in full time education the change doesn’t apply to her.

OP the provision in section F should be dependent on DD’s needs and what she can manage. It doesn’t have to be any form of direct provision. It could include equipment/subscriptions/memberships for whatever she enjoys doing - art/cooking/gaming/exercise/music... Or pre recorded/pre set formal work if she can manage the education side of things but not the interaction. And therapy working towards being better able to engage and improved functioning.

Thank you, AReallyUsefulEngine, some really helpful information there. 🙂