Illness benefit/partial capacity

Redo22

Hi, I have two questions about illness benefit and partial capacity benefit so would appreciate any information from people in the know.

First, I am a primary school teacher and the dept of ed pay for my sick leave up to a certain amount of days in a four year period. If I still claim illness benefit while I am getting paid sick leave and send the mc1 and mc2 forms to the dept to get my illness benefit instead, will this count as time spent receiving illness benefit for the six months required before applying for partial capacity benefit?

Second, as I said I am a primary school teacher but have been diagnosed with a long term illness that is making it extremely difficult to work fulltime. My consultant would like me to look into retiring from teaching altogether or at least jobshare as it is making my illness worse and severely impacting on my quality of life as I am fit to do nothing but go to bed every day and all weekend after work. I can't continue like this.

However, to jobshare I would have to wait until march to apply and it would only commence in September. I have been in and out of school on and off for long periods of time but never for six months continuously as I am conscious of my pay running out so have tried to go in as much as possible. Would I have to be off sick and claiming illness benefit for six months continuously right through to September in order to qualify? This is what my consultant would like me to do but I still feel like I can work sometimes and want to still go in when I feel I can.

Assuming I would qualify for something under the partial benefits scheme on top of the half pay I would get for jobsharing as a teacher, would it be worth my while in staying off sick to make up the six months before September instead of going back in and out for a week here and there?

Any advice would be appreciated,
Thanks

LegacyUser

Redo22, your first part confuses me. When you've been out sick, surely the Dept of Ed required you to send in MC1/Mc2 to Social Protection anyway? The Dept of Ed pays you while the Dept of Social Protection pays them. If this was the case, those days do still count as you on Illness Benefit.

You have to be on Illness continuously for 6 months (no breaks) to be eligible for Partial Capacity Benefit.

Only you can make the decision if its worthwhile to stay off to get that 6 months. But be aware, all your Illness Benefit claims will link together (if theres a gap of less than 6 months between them) and once you reach 2 years Illness Benefit, your benefit will exhaust. However if it exhausts while you're on Partial Capacity Benefit, you can re-qualify for a further 2 years if you work for 13 weeks.