Living Allowance – A Brief Guide for Parents

What is Disability Living Allowance?

Disability Living Allowance (DLA) is a tax-free benefit for children (and adults) who need help with personal care or have walking difficulties because they are physically or mentally disabled. It is intended to contribute towards the extra costs arising from disability. Other points you may want to know about:

• DLA is not usually taken off other benefits and tax credits you may receive.
• You can claim for a child even if you have not paid any National Insurance contributions.
• You do not have to pay tax on a child’s DLA.

Parents who are caring for a child in receipt of the highest two rates of the care component of DLA may be entitled to claim Carer’s Allowance (see below).

Hint: You may not think of your child as disabled, but if your child has a health condition or illness that means that they need the sort of help described below, they may be able to get DLA.

Who can claim DLA?

Any disabled child may qualify for DLA – the benefit is not dependent on the disabling condition but on the care or walking difficulties that arise. A child can normally only get DLA when they have needed help for three months and their needs are likely to continue for at least a further six months. This means the earliest DLA can be paid from is three months. For children who have terminal conditions there are ‘special rules’ which mean the benefit can be paid from birth.

It doesn’t matter if you work or not or if your family has savings or other money coming in, you can still claim for a child.

Please note that you can claim DLA for your child while they are in hospital. However, it may not payable until your child leaves hospital.

Hint: Do not let the fact that your child is in hospital put you off claiming DLA. Entitlement to DLA can be established while your child is in hospital which can affect payment or entitlement to other social security benefits and other forms of help.

DLA is made up of two components: the care component and the mobility component.

Care Component

To get the care component your child’s disability must be severe enough for them to need any of the following:

• help with things such as washing, dressing, eating, getting to and using the toilet, communicating their needs or developing their social skills and learning, including learning through play.
• watching over to avoid putting themselves or others in substantial danger. This could mean watching over them when taking medicines or having treatment, to make sure they stay safe when doing day-to-day things or if they have problems with their behaviour.
• someone with them when they are on dialysis.

A child can normally only get the care component if they need much more help with attention or watching over than other children of the same age.

There are three rates of the care component, depending on how your child’s disability affects them:

• the lowest rate, if they need help or watching over for some of the day or, if they are 16 or over, they are unable to prepare a cooked main meal.
• the middle rate, if they need help or watching over frequently throughout the day, or during the night, or someone with them while on dialysis.
• the highest rate, if they need help or watching over frequently throughout the day and during the night.

Hint: Your child could be entitled if they require as little as 1 hour of help a day.

Mobility Component

To get the mobility component of DLA, your child must be at least 3 years old (5 in the case of the lower rate) and their disability means they have any of the following walking difficulties:

• they are unable or virtually unable to walk (taking account of distance, speed, manner of walking or discomfort), or they have no feet or legs.
• they are assessed to be both 100% disabled because of loss of eyesight and not less than 80% disabled because of deafness and they need someone with them when they are out of doors.
• they are severely mentally impaired with severe behavioural problems and qualify for the highest rate of the care component.
• the effort of walking could threaten their life or seriously affect their health.
• they need guidance and/or watching over from another person when walking out of doors in unfamiliar places.

Hint: There are no hard and fast rules about how far your child can or cannot walk – distance alone is not the key feature.

There are two rates of the mobility component depending on how your child’s disability affects them:

• from age 5 – the lower rate, if they need much more guidance or supervision out of doors than other children of the same age.
• from age 3 – the higher rate, if they have any of the other, more severe, walking difficulties detailed above.

Hint: The rules may look complicated but don’t let that put you off making a claim!

How to claim DLA

Claims can be completed online through the Directgov website or the claim form can be printed off to be completed and submitted later (but that may delay when DLA can be paid from). Alternatively you can contact the Benefits Enquiry Line for a claim form: 0800 88 22 00 (8.30 am to 6.30 pm, Monday to Friday and 9.00 am to 1.00 pm on Saturday) or textphone 0800 24 33 55.

Hint: Always put lots of details about how the child’s condition affects them and you, and how much extra help/watching over is needed as a result. Too much information/detail is better, in this instance, than not enough. You may find it helpful to keep a diary to record exactly how much help has to be given and why.

The Contact a Family website has a helpful downloadable guide (PDF) to claiming DLA for children.

Carer’s Allowance

Carer’s Allowance (CA) is available to people over the age of 16 who are not in full-time education and are caring for at least 35 hours a week for someone who is entitled to the middle or highest rate care component of DLA. Entitlement is not affected by capital or savings. In addition to these rules the carer cannot be earning more than £95 a week (but check this amount as it goes up every now and again) after the deduction of certain allowable expenses such as:

• some National Insurance (NI) contributions.
• Income Tax.
• half of any money you pay towards personal or occupational pension schemes.
• other expenses you have to pay because they are a necessary part of your job.

After taking off these amounts, you are allowed up to half the rest of the money you earn to help meet the cost of paying someone else (but not a close relative) to look after a child or children, or the person you look after, while you are at work.

You may be able to get an additional amount for your partner or someone living with you who looks after your dependent children.

Hint: Please note that receipt of CA can affect other benefits.

Further details on CA, including how to claim, can be found on the Directgov website. The Benefits Enquiry Line can also offer advice on eligibility to Carer’s Allowance – see above for details.

Further information

The Directgov website provides a wide range of information for disabled people and carers in addition to benefits advice.

Contact a Family (0808 808 3555) offers confidential, independent advice about any aspect of caring for a child with additional needs. They also have a fact sheet on Benefits, Tax Credit, and other financial help.

Carers UK provide information and advice on carers’ rights and benefits. They have a dedicated Freephone helpline for carers on 0808 808 7777.

The information above is only intended as a very general guide. It does not cover every circumstance and it is possible that some of the information is oversimplified, or may become inaccurate over time, for example because of a change to the law.