5. Claiming universal credit
You usually make a claim online at . Help with online claims over the telephone, telephone claims and face-to-face claims should also be possible if required. You claim for yourself if you are single or a lone parent. If you are in a couple, you make a joint claim with your partner. You can get help to make your claim from the free Help to Claim telephone service run by Citizens Advice (details at ).
The DWP administers universal credit (UC), and payments are made monthly in arrears. In Scotland, payments can be made twice-monthly and rent amounts can be paid directly to your landlord.1The Universal Credit (Claims and Payments) (Scotland) Regulations 2017 No.227 In exceptional circumstances, you can request alternative payment arrangements – eg, to get paid more regularly, or to get the payment split between you and your partner. This is a discretionary decision. See CPAG’s Welfare Benefits and Tax Credits Handbook (for subscribers) for more information. If you are an employee, you do not usually need to report any changes in your earnings, as HMRC provides this information directly to the DWP.
If you do not have enough money to live on while waiting for your first payment of UC, you can ask for an advance payment. This can be for up to 100 per cent of your award, and you repay it over the subsequent 24 months.
UC advances can also be made when your needs have increased and you are waiting for an extra element of UC to be paid with your next monthly regular payment – eg, when you first have a new baby or become responsible for a child. Awards are at the DWP’s discretion. You must repay an advance, usually from the next three months’ UC payments.
You can also ask for a loan, called a budgeting advance of UC, to meet certain needs once you have been getting UC for six months. Budgeting advances of UC must normally be repaid from your next 24 months’ UC payments. See CPAG’s Welfare Benefits and Tax Credits Handbook (for subscribers) for more information. Since December 2023, following feedback from the Independent Case Examiner, the DWP says itnow requires full student finance information and an award calculation before UC payments can be made to students.2 This is to reduce large overpayments occurring. If you are on one (or more) of the working-age means-tested benefits and tax credits that UC is replacing, and are told you must now claim UC (ie, under the ‘managed migration’ process), special rules may apply. Someone who is ‘receiving education’ and is ‘manage migrated’ to UC can get UC even if they do not fit the usual UC rules (to the end of that course).3Reg 60 The Universal Credit (Transitional Provisions) Regulations 2014 No.1230 In certain circumstances, this protection is lost – eg, if you form a couple or separate. See CPAG’s Welfare Benefits and Tax Credits Handbook (for subscribers) for more information.