My client is 18 years old and has DLA (learning disability).

She was classed as a dependent of her parents until early September.

On 13/9/04 she started part-time work and works between 7.5 and 12 hours a week at £5.04 an hour. She had hoped this would be 16 hours a week and planned to claim WTC.

Unfortunately the employer doesn't know when she will be able to increase hours of work to 16.

Incapacity Benefit section say they will treat the work as permitted work if she applies for IB and asks for the claim to be backdated to before she started work. As long as she gets med certs going back 28+ weeks she will get £55.90 pw. I'm not sure though if GP will supply med cert especially as she is now working, what are the likely problems?

Income Support DM guide says she won't be treated as in remunerative work if she is a disabled worker. Is she a disabled worker and able to claim IS without an IB claim in the background? If so she can get earnings topped up to £67.75 pw.

Jobseekers' Allowance - there should be no difficulty claiming this and she will get the earnings topped up to £67.75pw.

Clearly she would be better off if she could claim IB but it could take some time. Is there anything else likely to get in the way of a successful IB claim before I advise her to take the easier JSA route?

Any help very welcome.

Shona

Shona,
you should first decide whether your client is a suitable person to claim JSA; if so then that is the proper route to benefits for her (she should be capable of holding a routine 9-5 type jop). If not then Incap Ben is the right route; this will be required to access and underpin a claim to Income Support. Med cert from the GP will of course be required, and should not be a problem getting this from the GP. Also suggest you seek a backdated Med 5 cert from the GP for past year; 364 days incapacity (not payment of IB) satifies the criteria for the DP addition to IS; this will increase IS bens title to your quoted £67.75 as this will not be achieved without the DP.

Note also there is no weekly hours limit for supported permitted work for Incap purposes; the wages limit is £78.00 a week from 1/10/04.

best wishes
Peter Patton

The reply above isn't quite the full picture (I think for one thing that it overlooks the fact that DLA is in payment, which guarantees the disability premium for IS or JSA).

I fully agree that the Incap route is the most advantageous if the GP is onside, though on the hours stated there will clearly be a time limit on how long IB will be paid (6 months, or possibly 12). Thought will need to be given to what happens if the GP won't stump up the backdated med certs, or even if he does, what to do when the time limit is reached and, presumably, the claimant wants to carry on working.

JSA is possible, but there might be less hassle with IS as a disabled worker. IB does not need to be claimed for this - JC+ must instead be satisfied that the worker can: either earn an hourly rate of no more than 75% of the rate which would be paid to someone not disabled; or work for no more than 75% of the hours expected of someone not disabled. I guess the claimant would probably fall within the latter category. IS Gen Reg 6(4)(a) says that such a worker is not treated as being in remunerative work, whilst Sch 1B para 8 states that the worker doesn't have to be available for employment - hence no need for IB claim.

One possible drawback - if claiming IS as a disabled worker with wages below the NI threshold, I think there's no NI cont given. Am I right about this? If so, JSA might be better if the claimant one day hopes to be independent of means-tested benefits.

Jim

Many thanks to you both for your help.

My client is optimistic that she will get her hours increased to 16 before the 6 months on IB is up. Because of her disability she would be unlikely to cope with many more hours than this.

The NI credits are an important consideration and I'm not sure how comfortable the GP will feel about providing sick notes to someone who is working and wants to do 16 hours.

My understanding is clearer now, I was worried I was overlooking something fundamental because Jobcentreplus contact centre had told her that she was not entitled to claim ANYTHING, even though she argued with them because I had advised her beforehand that she could.

Shona

Shona,
if your client can be said to be doing "Supported Permitted Work" there is no time limit; you may wish to see form PW1 available from the Incap section.

Good luck


Peter