Disability related expenditure assessment
When we work out how much you can afford to pay towards your care and support in your own home or in the community we allow £17 per week for any disability related expenses. We call it a Standard Disability Related Expenditure Allowance.
You can ask for an individual disability related expenditure assessment only when you:
- think your disability related expenses are higher than £17 per week, and
- get a disability benefit (Attendance Allowance, Disability Living Allowance Care Component (middle or higher rates only), Personal Independence Payment Care Component (standard or enhanced rates only), Constant Attendance Allowance, Exceptionally Severe Disablement Allowance).
Disability related expenses
The expenses are about your disability. They are above the spending a person without your disability would expect to pay. They are unique to you.
When you need to spend money on things to help you to manage your disability, these expenses are ignored in your financial assessment.
Think about what a disability expense would be.
- Think about your day-to-day life. Think about the equipment, aids, services, or items you must use because of your disability.
- Think about different times of the year. If you might use some items or services more than others, for example extra heating in winter months.
- Think whether the expenses you want us to consider are already available from the NHS for free.
- Check your care and support plan to see if you pay for anything related to your disability that is not included there.
- Think about what is different between what you must spend compared to a relative, friend or neighbour who does not have a disability.
- Look at your bills and receipts to see what you spend in a week, month or year.
- Check the disability benefits you get.
Evidence you need
You will need to provide us with evidence. For example, bills, invoices, receipts, contracts, bank statements of the extra expense. We expect the evidence to be for a 3 month period or longer depending on the type of expense.
Receipts for a one-off expense must be dated and purchased during the current financial year.
Your social care practitioner will help you decide what receipts to give us.
You may need other information from a qualified medical professional. For example, if you ask for some items relating to a health condition or dietary need.
Request a disability related expenditure assessment
Contact your social care practitioner. They will talk about your situation and the extra disability related expenses you have.
They will check you get a disability benefit.
We look at the evidence you provide. We will let you know if we need more evidence or other information and by when.
How we work out the extra disability related expense
This depends on what it is. For example, your yearly utility expenses are higher than the average for your size of household. We can make an allowance for the extra.
Once all the evidence is gathered and if the expenses are considered reasonable, we add them together. We do this to find out if you are over the weekly Standard Disability Related Expenditure Allowance.
If it is over, we will take off this higher amount when looking at your income in the financial assessment.
If less, the weekly Standard Disability Related Expenditure Allowance continues.
Decision
We decide if the extra disability related expenses are reasonable. If the evidence supplied is enough.
We may decide that some or all the extra expenses are not reasonable. We will explain why and how you ask us for a revision of the decision.
If you disagree with our decision, discuss this with your social care practitioner.
When we decide the extra expenses are reasonable and about your disability, we will let you know. We will let you know how this changes your financial contribution towards your care and support.
Depending on the extra expenses we approve, we may ask you to keep ongoing receipts or bills.
When the individual disability related expenditure allowance applies from
The disability related expenditure assessment may take some time to complete, especially if more information is needed or receipts not kept.
The individual allowance will start from the date we get the last suitable supporting evidence.
Looking again at the individual disability related expenditure allowance
At least once a year, we will look again at your agreed individual allowance. This is part of your planned care and support review.
We will look at the evidence we asked you to keep.
Looking again makes sure changes to needs and disability related expenses continue to be right in your financial assessment.
You can ask us to look again at your individual allowance any time if you have extra expenses.
Independent advice
Contact one of the following organisations for general guidance and advice, or they may be able to point you towards suitable independent financial advisors.