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Quick Question
- spasm
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My husband has been awarded DLA for life, high rate on both mobility and care. The local Social Services have now allocated my husband a "Direct Payment Package" - enough for me to hire somebody to take him out a few hours a week.
The money from this package "has" to be used for his "socialisation", obviously we would not keeping any of this money ourselves. I myself being the hirer for this service would then become the employer for whomever we had to take spasm out.
This means that I would have to deal with the tax and national insurance side of things.
We are a little worried as could this be seen by the DWP as a change of circumstances, which would then mean that my husband/spasm would have to go through the PIP assessment now?
what are your thoughts on this matter?
Mrs Spasm
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- Gordon
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spasm wrote: Dear Benefits and Work Team,
My husband has been awarded DLA for life, high rate on both mobility and care. The local Social Services have now allocated my husband a "Direct Payment Package" - enough for me to hire somebody to take him out a few hours a week.
The money from this package "has" to be used for his "socialisation", obviously we would not keeping any of this money ourselves. I myself being the hirer for this service would then become the employer for whomever we had to take spasm out.
This means that I would have to deal with the tax and national insurance side of things.
We are a little worried as could this be seen by the DWP as a change of circumstances, which would then mean that my husband/spasm would have to go through the PIP assessment now?
what are your thoughts on this matter?
Mrs Spasm
I do not believe that these count as a Change of Circumstances, your husbands health has not changed, and DLA is not affected by any monetary considerations, on the broader issue of PIP, it is only a Change of Circumstances that is likely to result in a change of award that will cause a transfer to PIP and this will not start until October.
In regard the tax and NI, you Local Authority should be able to provide you with a payroll service, for a small fee, which calculates the pay, tax, NI, etc. for your employee, all you have to do is write cheques to pay everybody. If they have not mentioned it, you should set up a new and separate account to hold all of the monies concerned with Direct Payments.
Gordon
Nothing on this board constitutes legal advice - always consult a professional about specific problems
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- spasm
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- Posts: 56
Thank you very much for your fast response. We are aware that we need to set up a separate bank account. We are only now starting the process for all of this, but spasm has made himself ill worrying that it may be classed as a change of circumstances and the whole process of setting it all up. I will ask the Social Services if they have a system of sorting it out, as this would make a big difference to him stressing about it and the subsequent health problems this causes.
Thank you again for your help.
spasms' wife
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