"Boarder" carers allowance heads up

forgoodnesssake

If you are on "boarder" Carers allowance (where the person you care for spends part of the year, usually term time, elsewhere and so you cannot claim) but they have not actually gone back for covid reasons and are still at home so you are still eligible for CA, just check that it has not automatically been stopped at the time they would normally leave home.

I just checked and found that I hadn't had any since 21st September, despite my son not having gone back to Uni for the time being, so I've used the online CA "notify of changes" service to ask for it re-instated, and back dated, until we inform them that he has returned.

Maybe this is correct procedure, but just at the moment my eye is on many other things! Also I had actually requested to come off boarders in March so I wasn't expecting it to stop!

Who knows how long that will take...

poppy123456

HI,

When i'm expecting my money to be paid i always check it's there. If it isn't i ring but to be honest in all the years i've been claiming benefits i've never had an issue.

As they were expecting your son to return to college then it's not really their fault that it stopped. Hopefully, it won't take long to start payments again.

forgoodnesssake

Yes, I agree up to a point however back in March I requested to be taken off the boarders scheme as I knew it would be a very long time before he went back!..so my eye was off the ball, as I think many carers' will be now.  (sorry @poppy123456 I have slightly edited my original post to make this point so it looks like you are answering the wrong thing..apologies)

I think it's the inconsistency of the way it works (or doesn't) that makes it so difficult at times.  Usually on Boarders, you get a time sheet thing sent out covering a month or two and you have to fill in when you have not and have been caring; and I would normally have got these over the summer vacation and so I would have made a note to them that he wasn't returning at the usual time.  However i have had none of these forms since March, when i informed them that he was at home for the foreseeable future, so naturally I assumed the boarder thing was not operational; but clearly in some part of their system it still is!!

It is reassuring to know however that many people don't have problems with DWP though!