26 January 2018
Universal Credit – miscellaneous amendments, including changes to the surplus earnings rules
Regulations have been laid which bring several important and detailed changes to the universal credit rules, mostly with effect from 11 April 2018.
Some of the headlines include:
- The 7-day waiting days is removed from 14 February 2018
And from 11 April 2018,
- A claimant who is in education and entitled to UC as a member of a couple will not be subject to work requirements if they have student income which is taken into account in assessing their UC award
- For claimants who have undergone a work capability assessment and are found fit for work, there will be provision to allow work requirements to be switched off to up to 2 periods of up to 14 days in a 12 month rolling period for reasons of ill-health (with some limitations for where the reason for the ill-health is related to evidence previously examined in the assessment)
- Where a claimant has been in receipt of housing benefit immediately before their claim for UC, the housing benefit payment will be allowed to run on for 2 weeks after the day UC entitlement starts
And the surplus earnings and losses rules, due to come in to effect from 11 April 2018, are amended slightly to adopt a temporary de minimis of £2,500 instead of £300 and also change the way surplus earnings are carried forward through assessment periods. We will be publishing additional information about how the new rules work in the coming weeks.
We will be updating the relevant sections of the website with the changes.
Universal Credit (Miscellaneous Amendments, Saving and Transitional Provision) Regulations 2018,
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