DWP Carer’s Allowance warning as ‘big problems’ hit Brits | Personal Finance | Finance

After a debate in Parliament on Monday, the government came under fire for the “broken care allowance system”. Dominic Carter, director of policy and public affairs at Carers Trust, reacted to the news that the government plans to introduce an SMS service to prevent carers from breaching overpayment rules.

This issue has left some care workers having to pay back thousands of pounds. On Monday, Work and Pensions Minister Sir Stephen Timms told the House of Commons that the department was looking at ways to prevent carers receiving excessive payments from the system.

This can happen if the individual’s income exceeds the benefit limit. Sir Stephen cited the “possible introduction of an SMS notification service” as one of these options. However, Mr Carter argued that this “does not come close to solving the problems”.

He said: “The introduction of text notifications does not come close to solving the problems of the broken carer’s allowance system. The government needs to go much further and fix this outdated, grossly inadequate service. It’s their complex eligibility criteria and low income threshold.” This poses enormous problems for nursing staff that no amount of SMS can ever solve. We hope the Government will have a much more detailed plan for the overhaul without continuing to burden busy carers with additional responsibilities.

Speaking in the House of Commons on Monday, Sir Stephen said: “The work of unpaid carers is absolutely vital and often heroic. We are committed to giving unpaid carers the support they need. We are currently exploring options to address the issue of overpayments, including the possible introduction of an SMS notification service.”

Labor MP Alison Hume voiced her concern: “Carers make incredible sacrifices to look after their loved ones, but they can be left deep in debt and paying back carer’s allowance after inadvertently breaching eligibility rules. Does my honorable friend agree that we as a society have a…” duty of care towards carers?

Sir Stephen admitted: “We want to find out what went wrong with these overpayments and why so many people were caught out. We have trialled the introduction of an SMS service which will see 3,500 claimants being notified via SMS when they inform HMRC DWP that the claimant has exceeded the current earning limit.”

Who is entitled to care allowance?

According to gov.uk, carers can receive £81.90 a week provided they care for someone for more than 35 hours a week and the person being cared for receives certain benefits.

It does not matter whether the person providing care is not related to the person being cared for or does not live with them. No bonus is granted for caring for several people and only one care allowance can be claimed, even if several people are caring for the same person.