How your Carer’s Allowance will be impacted
The earnings limit for Carer’s Allowance is £100 a week, so you must report immediately if you earn more than £110 per week in a pay period, as you will not be eligible for Carer’s Allowance for a period of time. So if you are paid 4-weekly and you receive more than £440 pay for those 4 weeks, or monthly and you receive more than £476 in one month, you will need to report this.
At present there is no agreed way of deciding how long a one-off payment will affect Carer’s Allowance but it may well be divided by the earnings limit of £110 a week and you would not be entitled to Carer’s Allowance for that number of weeks. So if you received a total pay of £880 in one 4-weekly pay packet, that would be divided by £110 and you would not be eligible to receive Carer’s Allowance for 8 weeks.
If your Carer’s Allowance is stopped for a number of weeks as you are deemed to have earned more than the earnings limit, you will then need to make a new claim for Carer’s Allowance to begin again after this time when your income is again less than £110 per week.
How to report your one-off payment
Contact the Carer's Allowance Unit of the Benefits Agency on 0345 608 4321 or use the link www.gov.uk/carers-allowance-report-change