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Universal credit and foster carers
I have got myself into a bit of a pickle trying to work out how fostering allowances will be treated in UC.
As I understand it foster carers get both a fee, typically £150pw per child and a fostering allowance, which is tapered according to the child’s age each week, e.g. The FN amount is approximately £160pw for a 10 year old. For tax purposes there seems to be two allowance disregards, a straight £10,000pa plus £200/£250pw. per child.
Applying those numbers to an arrangement where two children under ten are being fostered we end up with an annual fostering income of £15,600 + £16,640 = £32,240.
The allowances are £10,000 + £20,800 = £30,800
And a profit to the carer of £1440pa or £120pm
Does this profit count as earnings and attract the work allowance disregard? or Income and not? Or have I missed something entirely?
Foster carers are not treated as self employed under UC -
As I understand it, because fostering allowances are not listed as unearned income, they are ignored
Thanks for your response. I got my proverbial knickers in a twist over this.