I've got a One Account for my mortgage (works like a current account with a huge overdraft) does the job centre treat these the same as ordinary mortgage accounts when you claim benefit please? I know you have to wait 9 months before you get help with your mortgage when on JSA and I'm hoping to be back in work long afore then - but since this is also my main bank account as well as my mortgage, I wondered if there were any pitfalls I should know about?
thanks in advance Charlie
See the threads on uk.gov.social-security -
Daytona
I could be wrong, but I believe that for Housing Benefit and Council Tax benefit your mortgage overpayments (if any) are counted as savings, but for other benefits they are not.
Robin
I was involved in most of those, and there's really no definitive answer, it seems to depend on how the regulations are interpreted. Anyway flexible mortgages and current account mortgages could be treated completely differently.
I'm pretty sure that with a flexible mortgage, you can make overpayments while you are working and these overpayments will not count as savings, as you've just paid down a debt. The fact that you can reclaim these overpayments is irrelavent, just like if you pay off your credit card every month which has a high credit limit - you have simply provided yourself with a line of credit in both cases. The only questionable thing would be if you used a big lump sum (eg redundancy) to pay down your mortgage (or credit card theoretically) shortly before claiming benefits - they could argue you have "disposed" of capital to increase benefit entitlement.
Withdrawing overpayments while claiming benefits *could* be regarded as income, as there are rules that say a loan can be regarded as income for the purposes of means tested benefits. Student loans are certainly treated as income for benefits purposes. In theory this could mean someone on benefits paying for shopping by credit card could be regarded as taking out a loan and the amount they've borrowed could reduce their benefits (even if they pay their card off in full every month)! In practice, I don't believe that withdrawing flexible mortgage overpayments or paying by credit card (ie borrowing money) would be regarded as "income" for the purposes of benefits - BUT a strict interpretation of the rules means that they could.
So, when it comes to a current account mortgage, every time you withdraw cash, write a cheque, pay by debit card - you are borrowing money (as your "overdraft" increases) - so similarly to above a strict interpretation of the rules could mean that such borrowing is treated as "income". In which case you're snookered unless you use a different (ordinary) current account day to day and don't touch your current account mortgage.
Home owners can't claim Housing Benefit - presumably you mean ISMI (Income Support Mortgage Interest).
Can you remember where you heard/read this?
BeanSmart website is not affiliated with any of the manufacturers or service providers discussed here. All logos and trade names are the property of their respective owners.