Non-residential care is support provided to you to help you stay independent in your own home, such as help with bathing, dressing and managing your medication, or help to do things around your home and in your local community.

This could include:

• Home care – this helps people in their own home. It helps with daily activities that people find difficult, like washing, dressing and preparing meals.
• Day care – this gives people with illness or disabilities the opportunity to meet others socially, take part in activities and enjoy some food and a drink in a supportive and safe environment.
• Day services – these help people with learning difficulties or mental health issues get help and support to carry out everyday activities. This includes learning new skills, enjoying hobbies, meeting others, going out on trips and taking part in leisure activities that help make people more independent
• Respite care – this gives your carer an opportunity to take a break from caring for a short while, although the service is for you.
• Direct Payment – this is a cash payment that gives you the opportunity to arrange your own care and support .

If we have assessed your needs and you are eligible for care or support from us, we will carry out a financial assessment to determine how much you will have to contribute towards the cost of your care.

You will need to tell us about your income. You will also need to tell us about any capital you have – this includes savings, bonds and other money or property you own. We can then work out how much you will have to pay towards your care.

How much you may need to contribute depends on your savings such as money in bank and building society accounts, stocks, shares, bonds, National Saving Certificates, Premium Bonds and cash.

In some cases, houses, property and land that are not your main and only residence can also be included.

If you have more than the upper capital limit you will have to pay the full cost of your care.

If you have less than the upper capital limit what you will pay is based on both your capital and income. We will carry out a financial assessment to work out the maximum weekly amount you need to contribute towards your care.

When working out how much you have to pay for your non-residential care, we take into account any capital and income you have.

We are required to make sure that you retain a basic level of income at least at the same level as The Minimum Income Guarantee (MIG). The MIG is set by the Government.

We also need to make sure that you have money for things that you need because of your disability and leave you some money for any housing costs that are not already covered by housing benefit.

If your income is below the MIG for your age group, we won’t ask you to pay towards the cost of your non-residential care services. 

It is expected that the Minimum Income Guarantee will cover costs such as:

• food
• clothes
• insurance, including buildings and contents, mortgage protection, life insurance
• utility bills such as gas electricity and telephone
• water rates
• transport, including bus fares and transport to and from day service
• TV licence and subscriptions to satellite or digital TV companies
• repair and replacement of household items
• repair and maintenance of buildings
• gardening – other than basic gardening costs allowable under disability related expenditure
• other expenditures such as personal debt (including county court judgements) and arrears
• social and leisure activities

This list is neither exhaustive nor exclusive.

When we work out how much you will have to pay, if your capital is between £14,250 and £23,250, a tariff income is included in your calculation. This is £1 a week for every £250 you have between these two amounts. Capital of £14,250 or less is ignored.

Disability Related Expenditure (DRE), is reasonable additional expenses that you may incur because of your illness or disability, and where there is little or no choice other than to incur the expenditure to maintain independent living.

DRE will only be taken into consideration if disability related benefits are in payment.

You are unable to claim for things that the NHS pay for such as incontinent products, specially made boots/shoes or podiatry for people with diabetes, peripheral arterial disease and rheumatoid arthritis, etc.

You will be required to submit evidence of your DRE as follows:

• DRE up to £30 per week can be claimed without supporting evidence
• DRE of more than £30 per week but less than £45, we require supporting evidence for the full amount up to £45.
• If DRE exceeds £45 per week a referral is made to a DRE panel to consider/approve.

The amount we ask you to pay will be based on your own income and capital only. If you have any joint savings or income with your partner, such as joint benefit claims, we will generally count half of this as yours and include it when working out how much you have to pay.

We take most income into account, this includes state benefits such as the state retirement pension, Employment and Support Allowance, Universal Credit and Pension Credit as well as annuities and occupational pensions.

There are serious implications to ‘gifting assets’ in this way, for both the person giving away the assets and the person receiving them. Where someone deliberately tries to avoid paying for care and support by reducing their assets - such as money, property or income – we call this ‘deprivation of assets’.

There are lots of different things that can count as a deprivation of assets, such as:

• giving away a lump sum of money
• suddenly spending a lot of money in a way which is unusual for your normal spending
• transferring the title deeds of your property to someone else
• putting money into a trust or tying it up in some other way
• using savings to buy possessions, such as jewellery or a car, which are not included in the financial assessment

If we determine that it is more likely than not that you have deliberately reduced your assets to avoid paying for your care, we can either include the assets you no longer have in the financial assessment or claim care costs from the person who now owns the asset.

When we have worked out how much you need to pay for your care, we will send invoices to you or the person who helps you with your finances. The first bill may be a larger than usual as it will be backdated to the date you started to have the care. After that, we will send you invoices every 4 or 5 weeks.

Details of the different ways you can pay are on the invoice.

Managing money is complicated and many people will find it difficult to understand.

If you would rather that someone else helped you to manage your finances, there are several ways of doing that.

You can ask someone to be your appointee for benefit purposes. To find out about this, please contact the Department for Work and Pensions.

If you would like somebody you know to manage all of your financial affairs for you, you can ask a solicitor to set up a Lasting Power of Attorney.

If you become unable to manage your own affairs, your relative or solicitor could apply to the Court of Protection for a Deputyship Order.

Service users who are not satisfied with the calculation or outcome of their financial assessment should discuss their concern with the Financial Assessment team in the first instance to ensure that the assessment has been calculated correctly.

A Financial Assessment Officer independent of the disputed assessment will reassess the information provided by the customer at the time of the assessment.

If the service user remains dissatisfied with the assessed charge, then they are able to request a review of charges by the Senior Financial Assessment Officer. The Senior Financial Assessment Officer will review the information used by the Financial Assessment Officer and scrutinise the financial assessment against The Charging and Financial Assessment Policy.

The service user will be notified in writing of their decision and state the reasoning behind it. Should the service remain dissatisfied with the decision; they are able to complain using the Council’s complaints procedure.

It is your responsibility to notify the Financial Assessment Team of any changes in your financial circumstances, which may affect your Financial  Assessment. This includes changes in your income, savings and capital. 

If you apply for and are awarded additional benefits, your assessment will be backdated to the date of any change.

Any changes will be backdated to the date of the change regardless of when we are notified.

The customer has 14 days to return the assessment form along with the supporting evidence. If the form is not returned after 14 days, a 7-day reminder letter is sent out.

If the form is still not returned we will attempt to carry out an assessment based on the evidence we can gather, however this may not be possible and in this circumstance, we charge the customer the full cost for their care based on the cost that is charged by the care provider.

In April each year, we will automatically adjust the state benefit amounts in the financial assessment, in line with changes made by the Department for Works and Pensions. We will automatically adjust the Personal Allowance in line with The Department of Health guidance. If there are any Bedford Borough Council Charging Policy amendments, these will also be automatically adjusted where possible.

Once the assessment has been adjusted, you will be written to with your new charge. At the same time, you will be invited to tell us about any other changes that might affect the outcome of your assessment. If you do tell us about other changes, your assessment will be adjusted to reflect any change from the date the change took effect.

Anybody else will be contacted again, later in the year, to carry out an annual review assessment. You assessment will be adjusted to reflect any change from the date the change took effect.