Council Tax and Housing Benefits

[jmp1]

Hi,

My husband was signed off from January 16th til March 28th due to surgery. He is self employed, he didn't qualify for Incapcity Benefit, could we still make a claim for any other benefit, or is it too late?

We thought about claiming the above at the time as we were living on my salary and it didn't quite cover the basic household bills, which is why we are now behind.

Does anyone know if we can still put the claim in to have some of the Council tax disallowed and back date any help towards paying our private rent?

Are there any other claims we could be making and if so to whom should we apply?

Advice is appreciated.

[tiglet]

You can only claim back for 3 months worth of council tax and you need to have a good reason for not claiming. if your income is low, you may also qualify for tax credits.

i would suggest visiting the CAB for a benefits check.

[ss002d6252]

CAB State up to 52 weeks with good cause:


Getting Council Tax Benefit backdated

You may be able to get some Council Tax Benefit for a period before you make your claim if you could have claimed earlier. Getting benefit for a period before you claim is called ‘backdating’. You can get backdated Council Tax Benefit for up to 52 weeks if you can show you have a good reason for not claiming earlier, for example, you were given wrong advice. You also have to show that you were entitled to Council Tax Benefit throughout the period of backdating – that you were responsible for paying Council Tax, and your income was low enough.

You will not usually get any backdated benefit just because you did not know that you could make a claim. You should explain on your claim form that you want to claim benefit from an earlier date, and give your reasons for failing to claim earlier. However, if you are 60 or over, you do not have to give any reasons and Council Tax Benefit can be backdated for up to 52 weeks automatically as long as you can show that you were entitled.

If you want to claim backdated Council Tax Benefit, you should consult an experienced adviser, for example, at a Citizens Advice Bureau. To search for details of your nearest CAB, including those that can give advice by email, click on nearest CAB.

[redsonja]

Yes you can apply to have Housing and Council Tax benefit backdated for up to 52 weeks but you do have to have a really good reason as to why you did not apply at the time.

Unfortunately, if it was because you didnt know you were entitled to it, this would not be good enough reason as the onus is on you to find out your rights regarding any entitlements of benefit.

Maybe you could post up your reason as to why you didnt apply at the time and I could help you with your backdated request.

Alternatively, feel free to PM me if you'd prefer.

[jmp1]

We didn't apply at the time, because we felt that in light of my income £1k per month, that we would not be eligable to actually get anything.

Unfortunately that was all we had to live on and our rent takes out 3/4 of that amount.

[redsonja]

Sadly jmp that would not be sufficient to be backdated.

Maybe we could have a chat about it.

PM me