Coding a one-off absence for Carer Payment (CP)/Carer Allowance (CA) when the care receiver is absent 009-06040010

A regular absence is where a carer advises that a care receiver will be absent from the home for 2 days every week for a certain period of time. A one-off absence, by contrast, would occur where the care receiver is entering respite care for 1 period.

Regular absences from care are assessed and coded differently from one-off absences.

For respite and hospitalisation purposes, a 'day' must include an overnight stay - that is, a whole 24 hour period, that is: 12am to 12am (midnight to midnight). Part days do not count in the calculation of absences for CP and CA.

This principle also applies when calculating absences where a CA child is away from the care situation for education, training and treatment (ETT).

This does not change the special rules around coding of respite in conjunction with the 25 hour rule - the 25 hour provision cannot be extended by using a carer’s TCC (respite) entitlement. For example, if a carer was absent from the caring situation for 6 hours per day due to work, they would reach 24 hours by Thursday (assuming the work was Monday to Friday). They could not then declare the Friday to be their Temporary Cessation of Care (TCC) day, because this would mean they were absent in excess of 25 hours per week. For more information, see Carer Payment (CP) and Carer Allowance (CA) carer undertakes paid employment, self-employment, voluntary work, education or training activities.

Different assessment and coding is also required when the carer is absent.

If the care receiver or carer are absent due to being overseas, the rules for TCC and portability may differ between CP and CA depending on the situation. TCC (respite) and portability rules must be considered together. For more information, see Carer Payment (CP)/Carer Allowance (CA) interaction of portability and temporary cessation of carer (respite) rules.

Note: if a child care receiver is in the care of the other parent when the carer parent is absent or overseas, this absence will be counted for CP only and will not be counted for CA. If the child is in the care of either parent, CA is payable and TCC provisions do not apply.

If the care receiver is imprisoned, this is also considered an absence and the carer's qualification for payment may continue. CP and/or CA will then auto cancel when the 63 days per calendar year temporary cessation of care limit is reached.

If there is more than 1 carer, does 1 carer receive CP and the other CA? If yes, the absence must be recorded against both carers when the care receiver is absent from both carers.

Regular and one-off absence rules and the 25 hour rule do not apply to CP (XWP) – Carer Payment (CP) that is paid under grandfathering provisions for ceased Wife Pension carers. However, regular and one-off absences still apply to CA as normal.

If a CP (XWP) carer’s only or last payment level CA is suspended or cancelled for any reason, or reduced to a CA HCC only, CP (XWP) will be automatically be cancelled. A carer loses their qualification for CP (XWP) permanently if payment level CA is not reinstated without a gap in entitlement.

Absence codes that only relate to CP should not be recorded for any TCC days for a carer receiving CP (XWP).

For more information see Transfer from Wife Pension (WP) to Carer Payment (CP)