DRAGGED DOWN BY UNIVERSAL CREDIT

Dear Gordon

I wonder if you are able to help?

My husband is 64 retired due to bullying in his workplace which caused depression. He took retirement early. His private pension works out £300 per month. He is now diagnosed with severe depression, anxiety and agrhophibia. Finally convinced him to seek help as we have now gone through our savings. His GP is backdating his certificates from March this year. My own pension is £1400 per month. Our mortgage payment per month is £900 and Community Tax is approx. £1500 per annum.

My area where I live has now introduced universal credit and we were advised to apply for this because of our situation. It took a whole day to fill in the forms online and to finally verify our accounts. We have been told after attending two meetings at the Job Centre the following:

Due to our pensions we are not eligible. I retired from the NHS with my NHS pension and had factored in my state pension at the time which I would have been entitled to at age 60. The government changed the rules and I missed out.

On the first meeting at the job centre my husband was advised to apply for ESA and that a Work Capability Form would be sent to him.

He has now been told to apply for PIP and fill in Form ESA 1 (UC). They have also stated that he may not qualify for anything. He has been out of work for 4 years and have been living on our savings. They think as he retired he has not paid contributions even though he has worked all his life.

Is he entitled to anything as he cannot live on £300 per month. Is there anyway of claiming in your own. I do now have to care for him and cannot leave him on his own.

I would be grateful Gordon for any advice.

Kind regards
Spitfire

Hi,
With reference to the query from trainingisgood, my husband is in a very similar position. He has been medically retired from work and, being on 54 when he was retired, he still needs 5 years worth of NI contributions to qualify for a full state pension. If we were in an area that did not yet have Universal Credit, my husband would have claimed ESA. Due to his occupational pension, his ESA would have been extinguished but, due to having an underlying entitlement, he would get NI credits. As we are in a UC area, my husband duly made a claim and was informed that he qualified for UC but that it was extinguished by his occupational pension. The underlying entitlement is still there but, he has been advised by HMRC that credits would only be awarded if he was actually in receipt of UC. Credits are not awarded if you have an underlying entitlement. Is this correct? It seems to be rather unfair as it is only a matter of geography that determines whether you claim UC or ESA. We have been advised by HMRC that, should my husband wish to make up the shortfall in his NI contributions, we would have to pay voluntary conts and this would cost us approximately £4000!