Backdated carer addition

Hi there,

I rarely deal with Pension Credit cases so I’d appreciate your input.

Client has been in receipt of PC (guarantee) since 2009 and was also claiming IB until mid-2013.

My client’s son won a longstanding DLA tribunal a few weeks ago and became entitled to HRC/HRM backdated to late 2012. My client made a claim for CA backdated to the date his son won the tribunal.

Client received a letter from the CA unit advising him that his claim was successful but that they couldn’t pay CA from the date of the backdated DLA award until the date his IB ended. Fair enough, as IB and CA aren’t payable together.

CA would have been payable from the day after his IB claim was closed until the date he turned 65 and started receiving his state pension, except for the fact that this whole amount was offset against the amount of PC he received throughout that period, so nothing was payable.

And then CA was not payable after his state pension started.

Now, because he had (partly underlying) entitlement to CA since 2012, and was in receipt of PC guarantee credit throughout that entire period, shouldn’t he receive the carer addition of PC backdated for the whole period since the DLA award?

PC have paid arrears of the carer addition from the date he received his state pension onwards but are refusing to pay any arrears of the carer addition prior to that. They said it’s up to the CA unit to make a “recoverability payment”, but the CA unit are saying it’s PC’s responsibility to pay the backdated carer addition.

My gut feeling is that it is indeed PC’s responsibility because the carer addition is part of PC, and as he had (partly underlying) entitlement to CA throughout the period from 2012 onwards, they should pay the carer addition for the whole duration since the date of the DLA award. But they won’t budge on the phone.

Sanity check, please!

Well…on gut feeling…I agree. I can’t see any obvious reason why, as he was in receipt of PC for the whole period, his award should not be reassessed to include CP for the whole of the relevant period…