Financial assessment for home care

When we went for power of attorney for my mum in law we were told by the solicitor that regards her money/savings- ‘it would not be unreasonable for mother to gift you each an amount of £1000 a year each, without any issue when all her finances are assessed for care. Any more than that would be seen as giving her money away’

That’s a couple of years ago.

He also advised us to take a thousand pounds each per year

3dognight

When we went for power of attorney for my mum in law we were told by the solicitor that regards her money/savings- ‘it would not be unreasonable for mother to gift you each an amount of £1000 a year each, without any issue when all her finances are assessed for care. Any more than that would be seen as giving her money away’

That’s a couple of years ago.

He also advised us to take a thousand pounds each per year

Thank you

I am only guessing, but I would assume it refers to giving away large assets such as her home or big sums of money.

To me, the amounts you quote would surely come under the category of everyday giving. If she gave someone £60 in cash or an actual gift costing the same, what is the difference?

I think its £3k a year in total you are allowed to gift .....otherwise seen as a deprivation of assets if you are already in need of care

£3K is in connection with IHT, not a financial assessment for care.
Are those amounts about what she has always given as gifts, in recent years? If so, it sounds OK. Presumably they were out of income, rather than out of savings? ie has she depleted her capital or just keptit from increasing?
These are the sort of questions a Decision Maker will be asking.

Cash gifts are fine .
Sometimes as relatives become older it may be a worry about future long term care and in anticipation of the cost of residential care home , large amounts of money may be given away and thus when the time comes the financial situation allows the care to be paid for by the local council.
Basically it's like using or hiding finances , so a claim can be made .

You are allowed to gift upto £3000 in any one financial year. You can also gift smaller sums for special occasions such as weddings-civil partnerships. If your relatives incur essental expenses (such as travelling or hotel expenses when visiting) reimbursement of these would also be considered reasonable.

So if all/any of the family have to travel and incur other expenses for visiting the relative covering these would not be deprivation of assets.

With the examples you have given you should be in the clear.

I’ve just spent a little time on the Gov website.

The crux of the matter seems to be the rule about deprivation of assets.

If it’s giving away that money that places her in a position to receive benefits but if she kept it she would then pay for some of her costs that would be deprivation.

Do the gifts come from her weekly drawdown?

The authorities are looking for money paid to other people to try and evade paying for care they can afford. As Cabbie21 says, they are looking for gifts and payments out of capital, rather than the gifts people buy or give from income to family or friends.

For example, giving a grandchild £10,000 for a house deposit or transferring "£20,000 to an AC for house repairs. Even these could be allowed if you could convince the authorities, it was not done to reduce your capital and was done not anticipating that you would soon need help paying for care.

Big Louis, the £3000 is tax gift allowance, not assessment for care costs.

Buttercup, maybe talk to AgeUK. I found it difficult to get a handle on the website advice and I think you may get a lot of confusing info on here.🙂

It’s 20 years since I was involved in these financial assessments. If your relative is able to be so generous with money to family this does not tally with your relative being assessed as so poor as to get care without paying something towards it.
I would check just to be sure.

NanaAng14, councils are - unsurprisingly - very hot on this sort of giving away of large sums to avoid future care costs.

Here is a useful factsheet from AgeUK
www.ageuk.org.uk/globalassets/age-uk/documents/factsheets/fs40_deprivation_of_assets_in_social_care_fcs.pdf

Sorry for a very late reply and thank you for all your replies. The financial assessment was completed.