Call our team of experts at Compass Continuing healthcare today to see if your relative is entitled to free care home fees. Our office number is 0121 227 8940. Alternatively please complete our FREE online assessment and we will contact you.
Who is responsible for care home fees in the UK? People often believe that in their old age the state will pay for the cost of their care and meet their nursing or care home fees. After all, they have paid their tax and national insurance contributions all of their working lives, they have never required any assistance from the government before, and clearly their care in their old age will be met by the government from the taxes they have paid? The only asset they have is their home. Surely this won’t be taken into consideration and considered an asset? Unfortunately this is far from correct and the reality is often rather grim and very expensive.
If an individual has assets over £23,250 then they are expected to pay for the cost of care in full until their assets fall below this figure. Additionally the family home is not an exempt asset and will be taken into consideration when calculating whether someone has greater than £23,250 available for the means testing calculations. With the average cost of a home in England now valued at just under £280,000 the reality is that the majority of people who require full time care will be expected to meet the cost in full. The average cost of care home fees in England is over £800 a week or put another way over £41,000 a year, so care home fees are very expensive and a very real problem facing people today.
There are fortunately exceptions to this bleak scenario and NHS funding for care homes is available in certain circumstances to meet the care costs in full. This funding is known as continuing healthcare funding, and is sometimes referred to as being NHS funding for care homes. Where it is provided an individual will have their care costs met in full by the NHS regardless of what assets they have. Continuing healthcare funding is not means tested and it is irrelevant whether in individual owns their own home.
To determine whether your relative should be paying for care home fees you need an expert in your corner fighting on your behalf. The Compass Continuing Health Care team leave no stone unturned in building a case on behalf of their clients to avoid care home fees where they are eligible for NHS funding for care costs via continuing healthcare funding. This funding is available where the need for care is primarily a health need.
In our experience the NHS often apply a higher criteria to satisfy to be eligible for funding than is the case in law set out by the Department of Health. Additionally we have experienced issues with a patient’s needs being incorrectly underscored so they don’t meet the eligibility criteria. Clearly this is not fair and ought to be challenged if an individual should be eligible for free care home fees they should not have to pay because they have not been correctly assessed.
Contact a member of the Compass Continuing Healthcare team today to start the investigation into whether your relative should be free from the liability for care costs. Our office number is 0121 227 8940. Alternatively you can complete a free, no obligation survey here that will allow us to consider the circumstances of your particular case.
Author: Tim Davies LLB
