7. Other benefits and tax credits
Income support (IS) tops up other income you have to the level of your basic requirements (your ‘applicable amount’). Most other benefits you get are therefore taken into account as income when working out your IS. This means they reduce your IS pound for pound. Disability living allowance, personal independence payment, adult disability payment and housing benefit (HB) are, however, always disregarded as income.
If you have children and get child tax credit (CTC), both CTC and child benefit are disregarded as income for IS.
Getting another benefit may reduce your IS, but might also mean you qualify for a premium with your IS (eg, getting carer’s allowance or carer support payment means you qualify for a carer premium), so you could be better off overall (although in this case, the person you care for could get less benefit – see here). If you get IS and you pay rent, you are eligible as a student for HB (unless you are a care leaver aged 16 or 17). Note, however, that new claims for HB cannot usually be made (see here). IS is taken into account when calculating whether the benefit cap applies (see here and here).