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Specified accomodatin
Good morning I hope someone can offer me some advice on a current situation I have with a local HB dept.
I am currently supporting a gentleman who is 61 years of age and who is currently on UC for his personal allowance and due to his health/disability problems he is in the LWCRA group and he also is in receipt of the enhanced rate of both dl and mob component of PIP (he suffered a severe stroke last year)
He moved in to one of our extra care scheme within our housing association in April as his previous accommodation was not suitable to meet his needs - he could not manage the stairs and a number of other reasons.
He lives independently in his flat however there are support staff in the facility 24 hours a day – if he needed assistance in an emergency - such as if he became unwell in the night, or fell and needed emergency assistance then he would get this straight away as like I mentioned there are support staff on site 24 hours a day – who are called the scheme assistance. He also receives daily support which is called a welfare check - where they make sure he is ok and if he does not come down for his lunch they will call to see him to make sure he is ok. Which is provided by the housing association. He does not currently have a specific care plan in place however his situation is monitored regular and if his health deteriorates then a care package can be created for him.
However HB are saying that he does not live in a specified accommodation and are refusing to pay HB and saying he should be claiming the housing costs through his UC - however UC say they cannot pay housing costs as he lives in a specified accommodation.
In the HB decision letter HB have noted ‘you do not have a specific extra care/support plan, there are no costs for support outside of your rent charged, therefore I am unable to award HB. They have used HBR 2006 75(H) in making their decision.
I am a little confused as to why they are not paying as they have paid HB to another tenant of ours who is in the same situation as this tenant (under pension age but only getting the LWCRA).
Can anybody offer me some advice as to what I should next? His current rent arrears are very high and is causing the tenant a lot of anxiety.
Sorry for the long post!
Hi Elin
I can’t speak on the specifics of the HB decision but what I would say is that if it is correct that HB cannot be paid, UC can absolutely be paid. One of the issues is that when people report their housing costs, they click the ‘Supported or Sheltered Accommodation’ button which pops up a message to say ‘You need to claim Housing Benefit’. This is obviously not a formal decision.
The Housing Costs need to be re-reported as council tenancy/private tenancy whichever is closest and the housing costs are processed in that way. You can also ask for an extension of time of the late notification of the information on the basis of his vulnerability and confusing set up. This allows the housing costs to be backdated up to 13 months but may need to go to appeal.
So there is a solution - either HB is correct and can go to appeal or UC can be re-reported and properly processed.
In the HB decision letter HB have noted ‘you do not have a specific extra care/support plan, there are no costs for support outside of your rent charged, therefore I am unable to award HB.
I agree with Rebecca Lough on the tactics but on the HB decision specifically, as quoted, this seems to me to be a classic failure to distinguish between a fact and evidence to prove a fact. The test under the regulations is whether he is receiving care, support, or supervision. This is a question of fact. If he had a specific care/support plan or was paying extra that would be evidence that he was receiving care, support or supervision. But if he does not have a plan or is not paying extra that is not conclusive evidence that he is not receiving care, support or supervision. The LA can choose to regard the presence of a plan or extra payment as good enough evidence for them to grant HB but they cannot do the opposite. Otherwise they are creating a different test to the one actually in the regulations.