refugee backdated benefits

so client has been awarded refugee status - waiting for child benefit decision regarding award and backdating to date claimed asylum.
however she has tried to claim tax credits and they wont accept a claim as has to claim UC.
is there exemptions to people claiming tax credits for backdate in this situation?
is there any similar UC backdating rules for refugees?

thanks

Child Benefit can be backdated.  Child Tax Credit can be backdated but only if the application is received within 1 month of the grant of leave. Universal Credit can’t be backdated.

The notes in Benefits for Migrants at 85 suggest that it may still be possible to make an application for tax credits for those tax years in which it would have been possible for your client to make a claim - i.e. before full service. You would have to consider when their postcode went full service and probably make a fuss to get them to deal with this properly as this is not something that they will be used to dealing with.

Asylum support is set off against the CTC payable which may well render the exercise pointless. This probably explains why no-one has really been kicking up a fuss about the failure to make equivalent provision in UC.

she has claimed CTC - got a letter saying you can’t claim CTC - you have to claim UC - not seen the letter yet so dont know if gives any appeal rights. should we lodge an MR against this decision or send a paper form in with a covering letter or…....?
thanks

You could do an MR; maybe don’t leave it at that though. You could be putting in a complaint, ringing up the reps only line, possibly putting in a pre-action letter - generally kicking up as much of a fuss as possible in the hopes that somebody reads it who knows what you are talking about.

But, as above, you are going to want to find out how much asylum support the claimant received and how this compares to their potential CTC entitlement over this period. It may well be that the CTC is wiped out entirely by the asylum support - in which case all you are going to achieve is making yourself look a bit daft.

CPAG are looking for clients on this topic, please see the call for clients here: https://www.rightsnet.org.uk/forums/viewthread/16082/