Can Disablilty Allowance be affected by compensation??

Solitaire

Completely confused... need help but don't know whether this should be on Benefits, Legal, or another forum entirely :o

My mother is long-term disabled and has been in receipt of Disability Allowance for the previous 12 years. She's soon receive compensation following a car crash in which she was a passenger (the crash also had a detrimental effect on her disability and a local GP confirmed that it's not "all in her head" or BS like that).

The problem is that the payout from the insurance company is probably going to set off every bell and whistle imaginable (I doubt it'll be that big, but my mother's never had large amounts of cash spontaneously pop up in her bank account!). What's the legal precedent for Social Welfare's handling of compensation payments? Will they seize all of it for themselves? Or use it as an excuse to cut off her DA payments? :eek: I doubt the fact that the compensation is in lieu of the fact that she has been harmed and suffered severely financially because of the incident would be taken into account!

I've found nothing on the usual sites about this specific issue so any articles or precedents anyone can dig up is urgently needed

mp22

Capital, for example, the value of savings, investments, shares, any property you may have (other than your own home). However, the first €50,000 of any capital you have is not taken into account. More information is available in our document about capital and social welfare payments.from the citzens advice web page on dis allounce

cee_jay

Its the first 20000 that isn't taken into account. Anything over that can be assessed as means against her and could reduce the amount she receives every week.

Solitaire

Thanks! I didn't know if compensation came under that heading. I wondered if the means testing changed while on (as opposed to applying for) DA. In any case I doubt the final figure would be anywhere near that much