Paying for your care home
As mentioned elsewhere, if your local council has agreed that you need to move into a care home, the local council is responsible for paying the fees directly to the home. Then, depending on how much savings and income you have, you may have a reduced offer from the council. How much you pay is worked out according to rules which are summarised in this section.
There is an ‘upper limit’ and a ‘lower limit’ for savings. These limits vary as follows:
| Upper limit | Lower limit | |
| England and Northern Ireland | £23,000 | £14,000 |
| Scotland | £22,500 | £13,750 |
| Wales | £22,000 | £20,750 |
If you have more than the upper limit in savings or ‘capital’, you will have to pay the full fees for the home. If you own your own home, its value will usually be counted as capital. However, there are some exceptions to this rule. First, if your husband, wife or civil partner lives in the house then its value will be ignored when your finances are assessed. Second, if a relative aged 60 or over, or a relative under the age of 60 who is incapacitated needs to go on living there, then again the value of the house will not be counted. The local council is also allowed to ignore the value of the house if it is the permanent home of someone such as a carer, although it does not have to do this. For the first 12 weeks in care the value of your home will be disregarded from the means test.
If you have less than the upper limit in savings, or, when your savings drop below this amount, your income and savings will be taken into account to work out how much you have to pay towards the care home’s fees.
Savings below the lower limit are ignored altogether. Savings between the lower limit and the upper limit are converted into a weekly income using a set formula.
Your income is worked out by calculating what money you have coming in each week. This includes the income from your savings, pensions (whether State Retirement Pension or an occupational or personal pension) and benefits such as Pension Credit. If you are on a low income you may be able to claim Pension Credit to top up your weekly income; this then goes towards your care fees. (If you get the savings credit part of Pension Credit you will not have to put it all towards your fees – you can keep up to £5.65 of it each week, or £8.45 if you are a couple.) If you receive Disability Living Allowance the mobility component is not taken into account, even if you are funded by the local council.
When working out how much you have to pay towards the fees, the local council must always leave you with a sum of money for your personal expenses – from April 2008 this is £21.90 (£22 in Wales) a week. Any income you have over this amount will go to the local council to cover your care costs. The local council should tell you how it has worked out how much you need to pay.
In England, Wales and Northern Ireland, if you are assessed as needing nursing care, the home will receive a payment from the NHS towards the costs of this care. Nursing Care is not available at Ocean Living.
In Scotland, you will get a payment towards the cost of both your personal care and your nursing care if you are paying all or part of your own care costs. This applies to people aged 65 and over. If you are not yet 65 you will only get extra help with your nursing fees.
Other Sources of Help
SAGA, Age Concern and Help the Aged give very direct and useful information on their websites. If you want to discuss your finances in confidence, please call Ocean Living, we would be pleased to give you our best advice. This is a family run business and we strive daily to protect our good reputation.
