Benefits and personal circumstances

Households’ circumstances are the main driver of the benefits that each household is entitled to. On average our users were entitled to £885/month, but households in vulnerable circumstances, such as single parents and households with a member with a disability, were entitled to monthly benefits of £1,071 and £1,266 respectively.

In this article, we will explore how households’ circumstances affect their entitlement to means-tested, contributory, non-contributory and passported benefits. We will compare how benefits entitlements change according to the type of household, the number of dependent children and whether there is a member of the household with a disability.

Household Type

Household type refers to whether benefits applicants are part of a single or family household. Single parents households have the largest benefits entitlement with £1,071 in monthly benefits. This reflects the following characteristics of the benefits system:

Households with children get the Universal Credit’s child component and Child Benefits.
Single parent households get an average of £278/month from Universal Credit’s childcare component.
Single-parent households have lower take-home pay than couples – £545/month versus £1,426/month.
Single-parent households are not affected by the benefit cap, which limits the amount of benefits that a household can receive.

Number of Dependent Children

Half of our users have dependent children, and not surprisingly, their monthly benefit entitlement increases as the number of dependent children increases. The increase in the benefit entitlement is mainly related to the child and childcare component from Universal Credit as well as Child Benefits. However, in the coming years, the Universal Credit’s child component will have a lower effect as the two children maximum entitlement will affect more households.

Disability

Most of our users do not have any members in their household with a disability. However, the households with a disabled member have an average benefits entitlement of £1,266/month, which can increase up to £2,353/month if there is an adult and a child with disabilities. This reflects the following characteristics of the benefits system:

Child disability and limited capability for work and work-related activity components from Universal Credits.
Entitlement to Universal Credit carer’s component (or carer’s allowance).
Entitlement to non-contributory benefits for people with disabilities i.e. Disability Living Allowance, Personal Independence Payment and Attendance Allowance.
Households with a disabled member are not affected by the benefit cap.

We hope you find this article interesting and are looking forward to keeping reading our Data for Good series. Please reach out if you have any questions or you would like to explore how we could help your customers access their benefits.