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SMI Loan & Cont Based JSA
I have a client who will soon be made redundant and will receive a redundancy payment well under £6k. She has worked full time continuously for three (3) years but lives alone with a mortgage! I understand that anyone requesting help with their mortgage interest payments can now only apply for a loan. Could you please tell me if the client is eligible for such a SMI loan taking into account she will be claiming Cont Based JSA. If she is entitled does client still have to wait a certain amount of time before receiving any help. Many thanks.
She will need to claim income-based JSA - or UC i f she’s in a full service area - to get help with her mortgage. As you say it is a loan from April 2018. The qualifying rules for the loan are the same as they are now so yes there is still a 39 week/9 month waiting period - and the payments will only meet the interest paid at the standard interest rate - currently 2.61% and only on loans up to £200,000
The housing costs will trigger income related JSA, so she can be on both.
However, as Daphne rightly says the money wont start rolling in to her lender for 39 weeks.
Don’t forget that periods of time on c-JSA can count towards the 39-week waiting period - seep.473 of CPAG 2017/18 for more on this. We’ve had a couple of cases come through to us recently where DWP denied this was the case, so make sure income-based JSA claim made on 26 week expiry of c-JSA and then remind DWP about housing costs coming into force 13 weeks after that.
The housing costs will trigger income related JSA, so she can be on both.
No it won’t trigger it, but there will be an entitlement to a loan if there would have been an entitlement to IB-JSA if SMI had been part of the calculation.