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Question about Assistance.

  • 05-01-2010 5:58pm
    #1
    Graceland
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 402 ✭✭


    A Friend of mine will be coming off benefit soon and applying for assistance. While she was on benefit, she had savings over 30,000 (mostly due to redundancy), but she has since spent about 10,000 of that. But now that she is going on assistance, what she wants to know is this - can the dole question her about where she spent this money because of it being a big amount. I was telling her that I didn't think they would be able to question her because at the time she was on benefit and she wasn't means tested, so in my opinion, this was her money to do as she wished with it. But I would really appreciate if someone here could confirm this for her. She is under the 20.000 limit at the moment, but when she shows them her bank statements, it will show that she actually had about 30,000 at one time. But as I said, part of this was spent when she was on benefit and not means tested. Do you think they can question her about this now that she is applying for assistance.


Comments

  • #2
    jimmyw
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 3,382 ✭✭✭jimmyw


    Graceland wrote: »
    A Friend of mine will be coming off benefit soon and applying for assistance. While she was on benefit, she had savings over 30,000 (mostly due to redundancy), but she has since spent about 10,000 of that. But now that she is going on assistance, what she wants to know is this - can the dole question her about where she spent this money because of it being a big amount. I was telling her that I didn't think they would be able to question her because at the time she was on benefit and she wasn't means tested, so in my opinion, this was her money to do as she wished with it. But I would really appreciate if someone here could confirm this for her. She is under the 20.000 limit at the moment, but when she shows them her bank statements, it will show that she actually had about 30,000 at one time. But as I said, part of this was spent when she was on benefit and not means tested. Do you think they can question her about this now that she is applying for assistance.

    I could be wrong on this but I think you have to have 50k before you are not entitled to UA.I had around somewhere between 15-17k when I changed from UB to UA.


  • #3
    blossom180
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 468 ✭✭blossom180


    Graceland wrote: »
    A Friend of mine will be coming off benefit soon and applying for assistance. While she was on benefit, she had savings over 30,000 (mostly due to redundancy), but she has since spent about 10,000 of that. But now that she is going on assistance, what she wants to know is this - can the dole question her about where she spent this money because of it being a big amount. I was telling her that I didn't think they would be able to question her because at the time she was on benefit and she wasn't means tested, so in my opinion, this was her money to do as she wished with it. But I would really appreciate if someone here could confirm this for her. She is under the 20.000 limit at the moment, but when she shows them her bank statements, it will show that she actually had about 30,000 at one time. But as I said, part of this was spent when she was on benefit and not means tested. Do you think they can question her about this now that she is applying for assistance.
    she is allowed have 20.000.it was her money to spend she was entitled to spend it whatever way she did.they will ask for bank statements and as you said she did have 30.000 but she spent 10.000 plus.so she is under the limit.


  • #4
    Graceland
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 402 ✭✭Graceland


    blossom180 wrote: »
    she is allowed have 20.000.it was her money to spend she was entitled to spend it whatever way she did.they will ask for bank statements and as you said she did have 30.000 but she spent 10.000 plus.so she is under the limit.

    I thought that was the way it was myself, but it's just nice to have someone else say the same thing. It's not that she has anything to hide, but she doesn't see why she should have to tell them what she spent it on, if she wasn't means tested at the time.


  • #5
    cee_jay
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 7,920 ✭✭✭cee_jay


    Graceland wrote: »
    I thought that was the way it was myself, but it's just nice to have someone else say the same thing. It's not that she has anything to hide, but she doesn't see why she should have to tell them what she spent it on, if she wasn't means tested at the time.

    They can ask her about the 10000 though - as in if it has all been spent in the last month or so - was it just moved to a different account to hide it from social welfare and things like that to avoid having the means assessed against her. But that's about it - if it was genuinely spent throughout the year and the bank statement shows that I am sure it wouldn't be questioned. But a few large withdrawals over a short period of time just before the means test might be queried.


  • #6
    Graceland
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 402 ✭✭Graceland


    cAr0l wrote: »
    They can ask her about the 10000 though - as in if it has all been spent in the last month or so - was it just moved to a different account to hide it from social welfare and things like that to avoid having the means assessed against her. But that's about it - if it was genuinely spent throughout the year and the bank statement shows that I am sure it wouldn't be questioned. But a few large withdrawals over a short period of time just before the means test might be queried.

    Thanks Carol. I can understand why they would ask if the 10.000 was spent recently, but this isn't the case. It was taken out a decent while ago.


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