LCWRA awarded after claimant reached pension age

I have a client whose partner died in Jan 2024. He was living with his partner in a council property but the property was solely in his partner’s name. Partner had been claiming housing benefit for many years. When the partner died, the client had to claim UC as a single person in order to pay the rent. When we made the claim I advised him that it would only be until August this year as he was reaching pension age on 5/8/2024. I advised him to provide a fit note as he has a learning disability that makes him unable to work. He has now had a LCWRA decision dated 22/8/2024. It is definitely over three months since he first provided a fit note (this was in March 2024) but we have already been told the claim is closing. Can he still expect to receive a payment?

In a word - yes. 

As the fit note was sent in March 2024 and the 3 months would take it to June 2024, the next assessment period is sometime in July.  so the LCWRA element should be included for a short time (July/August)

My question is more about the fact that he has already received his last UC payment on 4/9/2024 and it did not include the LCWRA element. I have seen the payment statement so I know the LCWRA element was not included. As I said, the decision on LCWRA was only made on 22/8/2024 so it probably has just not been processed yet, but that is his last payment. Can he expect to receive another payment from UC, or is the claim just closed now and there will be no further payments?

If your client’s last payment was 04/09/24 then presumably his last AP was 29/07/24 - 28/08/24.

As he reached pension age in that AP, his UC entitlement would end on 28/08/24.

The decision that he had LCWRA was made on 22/08/24,  prior to his entitlement ending so he would expect to be paid the element for that AP with backdating in the normal way.

Possibly as his award has ended, there could be some extra administrative complications but in principle he should be paid.