To calculate what your Housing Benefit payment will be, we compare your finances (income and capital) to how much the government says that you and your family need to live on (this is called the applicable amount) each week.

We’ll use the following information:

• the money you and your partner have coming in, including:
  • earnings
  • some benefits
  • tax credits
  • pensions
• your savings (and your partner's savings), including:
  • money you have in your bank accounts or building society accounts
  • assets (such as property or land)
  • stocks, shares and premium bonds
• your circumstances, such as:
  • your age
  • the number of people in your household and their ages
  • if you or any of your family are disabled
  • if anyone who lives with you could help with the rent

How much of War Pension income is taken into account in the income calculation

We have resolved to fully disregard income received from (prescribed) War Disablement pension and (prescribed) War Widows (Widowers) pension for both claimant and partner, in accordance with the Housing Benefit Regulations 2006, when calculating Housing Benefit.

Non-dependants

A non-dependant is someone aged 18 or over who lives with you but is not a tenant or a lodger. For example, a grown-up son or daughter who lives at home.

In most cases, we’ll make a deduction from your Housing Benefit because we expect that your non-dependants will help towards housing costs, whether they do or not.

The amount we take will be decided based on their gross income.

Our non-dependants deductions leaflet has more information.