Linking rules
For child benefit, child disability payment (CDP), disability living allowance (DLA), adult disability payment (ADP) and personal independence payment (PIP) if your child has two or more periods in a care home separated by 28 days or less, it counts as the same period.1Reg 10(2) CB Regs; reg 10(5)(a) SS(DLA) Regs; reg 32(4) SS(PIP) Regs; reg 17(3) DACYP(S) Regs; reg 27(3) DAWAP(S) Regs For CDP, DLA, ADP and PIP, your child does not count as being in a care home on the day they go in or on the day they come home.2Reg 9(7) SS(DLA) Regs; reg 32(2) SS(PIP) Regs; reg 19 DACYP(S) Regs; reg 31(2) DAWAP(S) Regs Example
Sarah’s daughter, Ella, is aged six and is disabled. She gets CDP higher rate mobility component and middle rate care component. Ella goes into a care home on 1 March and comes home again on 15 March.
For CDP purposes, this counts as 13 days in a care home.
Ella then goes back into the care home on 5 April and comes home on 5 July.
For CDP purposes, the two periods are separated by 22 days. The two periods in the care home count as the same period because they are separated by 28 days or less.
Ella’s CDP care component stops on 21 April because on that date she counts as having been in a care home for four weeks.
If your child has regular stays in a care home (eg, for respite), you may be able to arrange them so that the separate periods do not link together and affect their CDP, DLA, ADP or PIP entitlement. For example, if your child has regular respite care every fourth week, eventually the CDP/DLA care component or ADP/PIP daily living component will stop each time they go for respite, if each period in the home is linked by a period of 28 days or less. To ensure this does not happen, you could try to arrange their respite so that more than 28 days separate each period they are in the care home.