Can anyone help with a universal credit calculation please?

[Bunny2607]

Hi everyone,
me and my husband have just put a claim in for UC. He is self employed works full time, i do 3 days. We have 2 children at home
one in nursery.

I think we would qualify for:
monthly standard allowance £617.60
1st child born before 2017 £333.33
2nd child £287.92
disabled child (our eldest) £156.11
TOTAL £1,394.96

our childcare costs per month are £507.60

I think we would qualify for the higher rate work allowance as we have dependent children and no housing help, so I think the first £673 of our earnings is disregarded.

i take home about £1830 a month and husband on average £1000 (he has only just started his business a couple of months ago).

does anyone know what we might receive? I’ve been told that our childcare costs have been approved so i think we get back 80% of those but then i’m not sure what other amount if any we would recieve?

we’ve never claimed anything before so i’m abit confused with it all 🤦🏻‍♀️

thank you in advance 😃

Use benefits calculator- entitled to

www.entitledto.co.uk/

Childcare element is 85% of your childcare costs. So that element is added to the others and then earnings reduce the whole award after work allowance taken off.
You can also add one of you as a carer for your disabled child and get the carers element added on to bump the total elements up further. One of you can claim this if providing 35 hours care for your disabled child. there is no earnings threshold for the carers element like there is for carers allowance.

Pretty much what @Babyroobs said.

If your husband is self employed he may need to show that his work is his main work and that it's genuine and effective. He may need to show DWP his books regarding the business's income and outgoings.

If you put DH as the carer he won’t be subject to the minimum income floor even after the start up year.

Thanks everyone!

So the government will pay you all that extra cash even though you both earn £2800 a month?!

Im genuinely shocked!

Yawn. The OP has a child with a disability AND childcare costs which UC pay up to 85%. If you have a problem with the elements of UC, contact your MP.

I won’t bother telling you how much my UC amount is with private rent, childcare costs, children, two disabled children AND the carer element. You’d pass out

@ButterflyKu

please don’t think I am judging as I am not - the figure op said didn’t even include the £500 she was getting towards childcare

I had always thought the govt were stingy as most people moan about UC but I actually think the amount seemed generous

And be assured I do not for a second underestimate how hard life is looking after children with ASNs and nor do I resent parents who receive benefits

I have got it that you are entitled to £629 a month. However someone is entitled to the carers element of it ( no threshold for earnings) this is going up to £195 extra a month. Your hubby will be best claiming this as he would have no minimum income floor then

They would have got Tax Credits before UC replaces them.

I think the theoretical max you can earn and get UC is over £60k. That would assume you have children at least one of whom has a disability and that you rent privarley in somewhere expensive like London.

Whenever you hear of people getting 'outrageous' amounts in benefit most of it's for their landlord.

Can you learn to read first before you start kicking off?? 🙄🙄🙄🙄

we don’t both earn £2,800. If you read my post you’ll see that I earn £1,800 and my husband £1,000. He works full time and i do 3 days as we have a disabled child and a 2 year old.

Thank you that’s really helpful. I’ve sent a message through my journal to ask whether I need to declare the carer bit or whether they will automatically apply this as we have a disabled child as i hadn’t realised about that. When the application asked about carers i thought it was if i cared for my mum or something so i said no 🤦🏻‍♀️

The criteria for the Carer element require you to spend 35 or more hours a week caring for a severely disabled person. To be treated as severely disabled somebody needs to be getting DLA for care at at least the Middle Rate (or PIP/AA for older people).

You can add it to your claim as a Change of Circumstances via the Journal.

As already stated it would be better for your husband to claim this as it removes some of the conditionality directed at the self employed.

op

yes that’s what I meant - it is obvious that 1.8k and 1k = 2.8k!!!!

and by the time you get topped up then you’ll be on a decent income imo

🙄

It is a decent income yes….but have you factored in we spend £500 a month on nursery fees and the mortgage is £650. Thats my husbands wage gone just on those??
so my wage has to pay for everything else which isn’t alot?? I’m not justifying myself anyway, we’ve both paid into the system and worked all our lives. The one time we need to claim and get some help i’m not going to apologise for.