Shared care for income support payments and principal carer determination 007-02050010

To be treated as a principal carer for Parenting Payment (PP), JobSeeker Payment (JSP), Youth Allowance (YA job seeker) or Special Benefit (SpB), a customer needs at least one qualifying child/PP child in their care.

Only One person at a time can be the principal carer of a child.

If shared care arrangements for more than one child are the same, it is not appropriate to 'allocate' a child to each carer so they both qualify. Assess care arrangements for each child separately. Staff must check if care arrangements are considered equal for multiple children, as only one carer can be the principal carer of both children. See the Resources page for examples.

If a shared care assessment is required, see Notification and assessment of shared care arrangements for Family Tax Benefit (FTB) and return here.

Who has legal responsibility for the child?

• Both carers:
• If the care is not considered equal, go to Step 2
• If the care is considered equal, go to Step 3
• One carer - does the carer make the decisions concerning the day-to-day welfare and development of the child?
• If yes, carer may be considered the principal carer. See Principal carer of a dependent child, go to Step 5
• If no, go to Step 2
• Neither carer - go to Step 2

Check if carer's level of care is at least 10% more than the other carer's level of care.

For example, where care is shared 54/46% the difference is 8% so care would be considered equal. Where care is shared 45/55% the difference is not less than 10% so care would not be considered equal and the carer with 55% has the greater degree of care.

Note: percentages between 45.1 and 45.9 should all be rounded up to 46%. Having at least 45.1% care means there is less than a 10% difference in care, therefore equal care policy applies. The system will only allow coding of whole numbers, so 46% should be used. However, care should be taken when rounding up 45.1-45.9 to ensure the other carer(s) is not disadvantaged when assessing whether the care situation should be considered ‘equal care’.

There may be circumstances involving more than 2 carers of a child, in which case the person with the greater degree of care could have less than 46%.

Is the carer's level of care at least 10% more than the other carer's level of care?

• Yes, the child is a PP child/principal carer child of the person with the greater degree of care, even if they are not claiming income support. Go to Step 5
• No, if:
• the carer’s level is considered equal (less than 10% difference), go to Step 3
• the carer is not considered to be the principal carer (not equal or greater care), go to Step 5

If shared care arrangements for more than one child are identical, it is not appropriate to determine that each carer has a qualifying child to be eligible for payment as a principal carer. All the children would be considered qualifying children of only one principal carer.

Staff must check shared care of other children prior to making a care determination. See the Resources page for examples.

Other factors need to be considered to work out who is entitled to PP/principal carer for JSP, YA, SpB for the child.

Is only one carer claiming or receiving income support?

• Yes, the principal carer of the child is the person who is claiming or already receiving income support. Go to Step 5
• No, go to Step 4

Consider all of the following:

• whether one carer already qualifies as principal carer of another child
• whether only one carer would be eligible for PP
• which carer would receive the higher rate of payment
• any other sources of income the carers may have, whether actual or potential, including both employment and investment income. If income varies, use an average. For example, over 12 weeks
• the asset levels of each carer

When deciding who is most in need of a favourable outcome consider the:

• relative situation of each carer, and
• impacts of the decision going either way

For example, qualification and mutual obligation requirements.

The following factors may be considered, if necessary, particularly in cases where there is little to distinguish between each carer's circumstances:

• expenses of each carer. For example, rent or child care
• workforce experience, education levels and future employment prospects of each carer
• time each carer has been on income support and their principal carer status during this time
• any other factors considered relevant by the decision maker, for example, a minor difference in the shared care percentages

Make such considerations after brief discussions with the carers. There is no requirement for this information to be provided in detail on forms or verified. If there are no substantial differences between the carers, decide maintaining the status quo.

See the Resources page for examples.

Note: where a customer is already current on an income support payment, use the existing details on their record about their income, assets and rate of payment for the comparison with the other party to the shared care arrangement.

For coding details, see Shared care for social security payments.

If a child is not a qualifying principal carer child of the customer for PP or NSS payments, they:

• may still be assessed as a dependent child of the customer, and
• should still be linked to the customer and percentage of care coded

If there is a change in principal carer status:

• ensure the SSC screen/shared care table records the exacts percentage of care, and principal carer indicator is updated correctly, as this can affect the rate of income support payment
• Check CHOC screen for any existing override reasons that may need to be updated. See Child Override/Claim (CHOC) screen
• Record a DOC on both carers record with the details and outcome
• Run the Child - Change in Care Arrangements script to create the appropriate letter to advise each carer of the principal carer decision. Consider relevant privacy issues when referring to the other carer in the letter

If the other carer is not a current customer, create a separate record for that person. If unable to obtain contact details for a non-customer (although there is enough information to make a shared care determination) show that a reasonable effort was made to comply with the requirement for a written determination.