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Forum Home  →  Discussion  →  Universal credit migration  →  Thread

Benefit cap on migration

Timothy Seaside
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Housing services - Arun District Council

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Does transitional protection help a person migrating to UC who was getting WTC, but who won’t reach the threshold to avoid benefit cap in UC (four weekly pay)?

Mark Willis
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Welfare rights worker - CPAG in Scotland

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Hi Timothy

The transitional provisions do not protect someone in this case because UC(TP) Reg 53(11) applies the benefit cap to the total legacy amount if it would apply under the UC Regs. This was highlighted in this WRB Article: https://askcpag.org.uk/content/209490/managed-migration-transitional-protection
So it appears they would be worse off as result of managed migration, with no change of circumstances - it may be arguable that the UC(TP) Regs are ultra vires in this case.

Mark

Charles
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Accountant, Haffner Hoff Ltd, Manchester

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I agree that they won’t be protected, but my analysis is a bit different.

Reg. 53(11) is (IMO) a terribly drafted provision, with a number of issues. But specifically relevant to this case, it would only apply where the claimant was not on HB before migration, but if they were on HB, then it wouldn’t apply (which is nonsensical).
Furthermore, the indicative UC amount is likely not to have the benefit cap applied (due to the income figure coming from the annual tax credits figure), and that is another reason for Reg. 53(11) not to apply.

However, in any event, transitional protection would anyway not protect a claimant from the benefit cap applying to their ongoing award, as the transitional element is simply an extra element added to the maximum amount, but the benefit cap is applied at a later stage in the calculation.

Reg. 53(11) only has any effect where the benefit cap applied to the UC claim at migration, but then the claimant became exempt from the cap at a later stage.

[ Edited: 7 Jan 2025 at 05:00 pm by Charles ]
Timothy Seaside
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Housing services - Arun District Council

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Charles - 07 January 2025 04:57 PM

However, in any event, transitional protection would anyway not protect a claimant from the benefit cap applying to their ongoing award, as the transitional element is simply an extra element added to the maximum amount, but the benefit cap is applied at a later stage in the calculation.

Thank you both. This is the bit that I was pondering - whether there’s anything to stop the cap from biting under the UC Regs - I was hoping I had missed something.

Luckily in this case my client has been able to increase her hours relatively easily - so she should be okay.

Interestingly, after I advised her about the benefit cap, the amount she might lose, and the amount of extra work she would need to do, she asked her Work Coach about it and they said they (and by implication, I) didn’t know what I was talking about and they basically said that nobody is worse off on UC.