St Luke’s Advice Service is happy to help you sort out your welfare benefit needs.  Our experienced volunteers are used to assisting clients with a broad range of needs and queries.

Sorting out welfare benefits can be very confusing, but perhaps it is easier if one thinks of the reason or reasons why one needs assistance.

Some welfare benefit entitlement depends upon having built up sufficient National Insurance Contributions (NICs), for example, Incapacity Benefit (IB).  Some are “means tested” benefits (MTB) which means that income and savings are taken into account in calculating entitlement.  Others are “non-means tested benefits” (NMTB) such as Disability Living Allowance (DLA) and Attendance Allowance (AA), Industrial Injuries and War Disablement although some non-means tested benefits are “contributory” (so NICs are taken into account) and others are “non-contributory” because a person meets the qualifying conditions, for example, DLA and AA which are benefits to help people with health needs.

Welfare benefits are used to help people if they require assistance to:

(i) replace income. Such as Job Seeker’s Allowance (JSA contribution) – so that entitlement is NIC contribution based; IB, Carer’s Allowance (CA); Statutory Sick Pay (SSP); and Statutory Maternity Pay (SMP).

(ii) help to reduce financial hardship. Such as Income Support (IS); JSA (income based); Pension Credit (PC), Working Tax Credit (WTC); Housing Benefit (HB); and Council Tax Benefit (CTB).

(iii) help with the extra costs of having a disability or having children. Such as DLA, AA, Child Benefit (CB).

Benefits need to be claimed on the appropriate form or through the appropriate office. The rules for claiming benefits are complex. Some applications can be made directly by phone to the appropriate local office of the Department of Work and Pensions, other applications can be downloaded from the internet or application forms forwarded from a central Department of Work and Pensions address. A good website to access www.direct.gov.uk which provides a beginners guide to benefits with links to other sites.

IT IS IMPORTANT TO KEEP TO ANY TIMESCALES GIVEN WITHIN THE APPLICATION FORMS.

If you want us to help you complete a welfare benefits form DO NOT wait until you have received this form; book the appointment as we can have waiting times.

REMEMBER: always keep copies of any application that you make and brief notes of any telephone calls that you may have with officials.