Paying for care

The assessment will only look at your finances, not the finances of any other family member, even if they manage your affairs.

You’ll need to provide details and evidence of:

• income and state benefits
• savings and investments
• any property or land you own
• household outgoings, such as utility bills

What we don’t take into account

The financial assessment will not take into account:

• the mobility component of Disabled Living Allowance or Personal Independence Payment
• the savings credit part of Pension Credit
• Guaranteed Income Payments under the Armed Forces Compensation Scheme to disabled ex-service personnel
• savings below a certain level as decided by the government

What we will take into account

The financial assessment will take into account:

• other benefits
• disability related benefits (eg the care component of DLA, the daily living component of PIP)

You will not have to sell the house you live in to pay towards any services that you receive at home. There are other payment options available to you. 

Deciding what you’ll pay 

We won't pay anything towards your care and support if you have capital above £23,250. This is called the higher capital limit. 

If your capital is below the higher capital limit, we'll: 

• work out how much income you have coming in
• ignore any income below £14,250 (this is called the lower capital limit)
• make sure you have enough money to live on (a protected amount)
• charge an amount from your income and capital above the protected amount

If your capital is between £14,250 and £23,250, for every £250 of this we take into account £1 a week as income.

So, if you have capital of £4,000 above the lower capital limit, we'll take into account £16 as income a week.

 Our financial assessment team will work out how much your care needs will cost, and what your contribution towards this cost should be. This is based upon your income, savings and any other assets you have.

We will also help you to get all of the benefits you are entitled to.

We will make sure that after paying the charge for care your income doesn’t fall below the Minimum Income Guarantee (MIG) as set out by the Care Act.

The MIG figure is an amount set aside to cover your everyday expenses when you receive local authority arranged home care. This is a legal requirement laid out by the Care Act 2014.

Disability-related expenditure

If your income is made up of a disability related income from the Department for Work and Pensions, you may be entitled to claim for additional expenditure that results from your disability or infirmity. Everyone's needs are different, so each eligible case is treated individually.

If you think you’re eligible to claim disability-related costs, tell us about these costs in the financial assessment form.

You’ll need copies of invoices and receipts of these expenditure items to verify your additional expenses.

It’s not possible to give a full list of the items you can claim but the following list will give you an idea of the types of costs we will consider:

• extra heating
• community alarm system
• extra laundry costs
• special clothing
• special dietary requirements
• disability-related equipment
• transport costs

We will send you a letter to confirm the charges for your care, and how much you’ll need to pay.